


just for tonight (and the rest of our lives)

by ABeautifulBreakdown



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: A/B/O Biology, Alpha Ben Solo, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Anakin is not a good guy, Angst, Awkward Luke, Ben Solo Needs A Hug, Ben didn't mean to guys, Ben really just has a filthy mouth, Ben wants to love her, Breathplay, Breeding Kink, Childhood Trauma, Clothed Sex, Cults, Dark Undertones, Deep Throating, Dirty Talk, Disrespect to the Toronto Maple Leafs, Domestic Fluff, Dubious Consent, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Family Issues, I think that's my thing, Mentions of Abortion, Mentions of kidnapping, Omega Rey (Star Wars), One Night Stands, Oral Sex, Pregnancy, Protective Alpha, Protective Ben Solo, Rey Needs A Hug, Semi-Public Sex, Sex, Slice of Life, Soft Ben Solo, Sort Of, Unplanned Pregnancy, accidental mating bite, brief mention of illness scare, childhood neglect, dark slice of life, different take on omegaverse biology, dominance through oral sex, if that makes sense, it's my head canon, just let me love you, kind of?, lots of dirty talk, non consensual mating bites, running away as a form of foreplay, she doesn't want to want it but she wants it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:54:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 41,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26627071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ABeautifulBreakdown/pseuds/ABeautifulBreakdown
Summary: It's nothing more than attraction, two strangers at a bar who happen to be biologically compatible. It doesn't mean anything, it's just sex. People do it all the time, hook up, fool around, fuck... But what happens when biology is too hard to resist? All it takes is one bite, just one to change everything.
Relationships: Leia Organa/Han Solo, Rey/Ben Solo
Comments: 145
Kudos: 624





	1. Lovers for a night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You want me to fuck this cunt?” A smooth press of his cock punctuates his point. 
> 
> “Yes,” breathless. 
> 
> “You want me to fill you up, split you open?”
> 
> She’s nodding now, pushing at the waistband of his boxer briefs, “Greedy little thing,” she nods again because yes, yes she is, she wants, no needs everything he’s willing to give her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was not expecting to post this until it was finished but have been encouraged and I'm weak so I bent like a willow branch. This was labelled "Domestic A/B/O" In my Google Documents. It's been edited quickly and is unbeta'd so please excuse any mistakes  
> Truthfully this is just porn... but there is a plot coming I promise. I have an outline which will involve more sex  
> I tagged things that I have in the outline but will add more should the need arise and will let you know in the notes if I do   
> LOVE YOU GUYS

She's never done anything like this before, it's reckless, foolish, insane. So why is she so turned on?

His hands on her body mark her, the heat of his palms sliding across the soft satin of her skirt slip as he rucks the fabric up around her hips. The dress had been chosen due to comfort and now it's proving easy access for this unnamed alpha. Good choice all around.

He’s unwrapping her like a present, like a gift. His touch slow and sweet as his hands burn a trail across her flesh like a comet. It’s almost too much, the way his palms nearly engulf her entire waist or the way he feels, the way he _smells_. She’s never been with someone like him before and the thought alone is electric. It heats her blood in a way that screams danger, warning. He could take and take and take and leave her with nothing and at this point, she would let him. 

She’d gladly give it all up for a pair of honied eyes and the scent of him. Like summer air and smoke with something just a little deeper. Sandalwood? Cedarwood? Some kind of wood, the way men sometimes smell, earthy and rich but so much more than that. 

His voice rumbles in her ear as his nose nuzzles against her neck whispering sweet things. Precious things that make her weak in the knees, “I’ve got you, sweet girl.” He tells her and it’s all she can do to nod wondering if now might be a bit too late to ask for his name. That’s not what this is though. That was never what it was supposed to be. Not that they talked about it as they left the bar, darting across the street in the rain. She’d felt like a teenager, his hand warm in hers as he pulled her into the elevator and pressed her back against the smooth glass wall with his mouth in her throat. They fumbled down to a room she assumed was his as he muttered curses and groped for a keycard in his pocket never once taking his lips away from her skin.

Was this what addiction felt like? This deep-seated need to feel something, anything. A deep hollow well of despair when that feeling is gone?

She could live off his touch alone. The way his fingers slid across her skin like a gas fire leaving hot trails of pleasure in his wake. Her dress is gone, the fabric sliding off of her shoulders in a cascade of fabric that rumples on the ground leaving her in her slip and... her brain scrambles to recall what sort of underwear she put on this morning. Not the come fuck me kind she’s sure. His lips kiss a trail across her shoulder tugging the silk slip straps off to the side until it too joins her dress on the floor. 

When she’s standing in front of him in plain black panties (thank fuck) and her black high heels he takes a step back and mutters a soft curse beneath his breath. His hands shake, she notices as he adjusts his tie, loosening his collar as if unsure what it is he’s supposed to do next. His scent is strong but he’s hesitant this large beast of a man, "Fuck you’re beautiful,” he manages and it’s hard not to blush. 

Maybe she was already blushing. It's hard to tell because her cheeks feel hot and the way that he’s looking at her right now makes her feel like he might just eat her up. Her hands fidget at her side trying hard to repress the urge to cover herself up. She needs to be brave, to stand her ground. Not show her belly so to speak because that would turn the tide of power here and make her no more than some wanton omega instead of a woman in charge of her own pleasure.

After a moment or two Rey finds her courage, her voice shaking slightly as she hums, “This seems woefully one-sided,” and nimble fingers reach out to work at his buttons. He seems shocked by this sudden assertion of control. His eyes lingering on her lips before down to her hands where her fingers make short work of tiny black buttons that strain against the width of his chest. He’s so big, built the way alphas usually are. Tall, broad, strong. She can feel the heat of him sliding beneath her finger, his heart rate heavy and wild.

Once divested of his shirt she starts on his belt buckle and slacks. The slide of leather like a bell ringing in the air. Her heels give her the advantage of a little extra height and yet still he stands a few inches over her. Tall, so tall and hard like he’s been sculpted from marble. His skin is so pale that he seems to glow in the moonlight because neither of them thought to turn on a light. She wonders if he knows how beautiful he truly is. Dark hair falling in a loose sort of shag around his ears. Ears that she realizes that are a little larger than the average humans but no less perfect in any way. 

Everything about him seems larger than life, the way he kisses, how he touches, the slide of his tongue along her neck as he draws her closer, holds her tighter. Everything seems so much more than she’s ever experienced with another man or woman for that matter. Is it just him, or the alpha that lurks beneath the surface? Could a man be a little of both, either or, or everything at once? 

There’s a soft gasp as his pants fall to the floor and truthfully it could have come from either of them. Her hands trace a path down along a soft chest and skin that feels like velvet until they’re splayed across his belly hard and soft and perfect. His boxer briefs do nothing to hide his mounting desire, the hard line of his cock arching up towards his belly and off to the side just a little. Even in the dim light, it’s not hard to see the blossoming wet spot spreading from the head.

“Fuck, I can smell how much you want it,” she hears his deep voice rumble before picking her up under the arms like a child and depositing her in the large comfy bed. She lands with a soft ‘ _ouf_ ’ and starts kicking off her shoes halted by his hand on her ankle, “Leave them on?” He asks softly planting kisses along her calf before adding a desperate, “Please?” And who is she to deny him this?

With a soft nod, she allows him to slide her high heels back on her feet like some sort of dark Prince Charming. No surprise that they fit, your reward good sir is a hot cunt to slide into. The thought makes her squeeze her thighs together, slick leaking down until everything beneath her panties is a hot wet mess. 

She feels more than sees as he sinks to his knees at the edge of the bed. His weight a pleasant reminder of his size when all she can see is the top of his dark head. His arms wrap around her thighs pulling them open leaving him no way to move his hair out of his eyes but a casual flip of his head. When it doesn’t work he blows at the stray strands making her giggle. 

Suave. 

It’s with careful fingers she pushes the hair back and away from his eyes so that she can see the strong curve of his nose and the amber of his eyes. His smirk is sweet when he kisses her thighs then presses his nose against the fabric of her panties. There’s a deep inhale, something almost feral that makes her thighs tremble as he presses his tongue against the saturated satin. Long and dexterous fingers curl into the gusset of her panties to pull it aside giving him access before his tongue that sweet sinful thing finds its home in her heat. It’s like her birthday and Christmas all rolled into one when he takes one long and languid lick. Like a child with a lollipop, he laps as her flesh noisy and proud before swirling his tongue against her clit. The sensation makes her keen, her back arched ever so slightly, pushing her hips up into his face. She can hear his dark chuckle as one of his hands comes to rest on her lower belly holding her still. 

“Need you to come, sweetheart,” he says it like a promise spoken only to her cunt, his tongue dipping in and out. 

“Pl—please.” She hears herself gasp, his mouth a hot heat pressing into her centre. The sounds he makes are obscene, grunting and groaning like he’ll never be full again. His free arm drops its grasp on her thigh and then there’s something blunt pressing into her.

It’s not thick enough for her body to resist, pumping into her with easy and unhurried movements. It’s his tongue and his finger and fuck. It’s everything. Too much, not enough, hot and cold making her body feel feverish with want. Her voice falters, words crashing into a moan as one finger becomes two and he’s stretching her now spreading his fingers so his tongue can slip into her drawing a line from her parted labia straight up to her clit, “You’re so fucking tight,” he marvels but isn’t that just something they say? ‘ _So tight_ ’, ‘ _so sweet_ ’, ‘ _such a good girl_ ’ the things males, be they alphas or betas feel their female partners like to hear? No one wants, “ _fuck your pussy is so loose_ ” whispered in their ear after all. But, the way that he says it, all breathy and lost makes it sound like it just might be true. 

“Come for me sweetheart, come for daddy.” The hum of his voice vibrates straight through her spine, “Let me hear that pretty voice of yours.” He’s stroking her slowly, applying a slight pressure from above when something magical happens. He hits something deep, something good, something wild and he knows it too. A soft chuckle falls against her thighs as he does it again, harder this time but softer too, his fingers stroking, petting, pulling her pleasure to the surface until there is nothing but his tongue and the pressure that’s building and building until something pulls taut, ready to snap and she’s there, right there, fluttering on the edge of it. Taunted by the gentle flicking of his tongue until his lips close over the sensitive little bundle of nerves and he sucks with a wet slurp. 

The sound and the feel of him throw her over the edge and she’s not keening, she’s _screaming_. Her voice is so very loud she knows she should be embarrassed but there’s nothing stopping the wave of pleasure that crashes over her like a tsunami. Still, this beautiful, wonderful man works his fingers inside her pumping and fucking and licking the wet that has saturates her thighs. Her body is shuddering, the tremors of her orgasm still running wild through her until her body still and falls back against the mattress. 

There’s a soft sound, like a giggle maybe or something girly that she realizes is coming from her, “Was that ok?” he asks quietly, his fingers slowing but still moving as his lips kiss a wet trail along the inside of her thigh. 

“Mmmmsogoood,” she mumbles taking a moment to recover, “yerturn,” because she needs him, her hands reaching out through the darkness. Fingers flexing in want of something to hold, “commer,” she nearly begs and he’s sliding along her body until his clothed erection is pressed against the useless satin that’s covering her core.

He kisses her softly, sweetly, totally. His tongue moving against hers, filling her mouth with the sweet, bitter taste of her slick. Impatiently Rey wiggles her hand between their bodies, palming his erection with lazy desire, “You want something sweetheart?” he purrs in her ear, “Use your words little one, tell me what you need,”

“You,” she hears a female voice that certainly can’t be her own whine. She’s never been so needy, so desperate for anything in her life, “All of you please,” rubbing her thumb and index finger along the head of his cock in a motion that mimics masturbation she shivers and he growls, actually growls against her neck nipping at the delicate flesh there tenderly. 

“You want me to fuck this cunt?” A smooth press of his cock punctuates his point. 

“Yes,” breathless. 

“You want me to fill you up, split you open?”

She’s nodding now, pushing at the waistband of his boxer briefs, “Greedy little thing,” she nods again because yes, yes she is, she wants, no _needs_ everything he’s willing to give her. 

“Tell me how you want me to fuck you, sweetheart,” it’s not an alpha command but there’s something in his voice that makes her comply. 

“Hard, fuck, so hard. Please, _please_ Alpha,” 

He doesn't even bother to pull his briefs down all the way. Holding himself up on one arm he tugs himself free giving his cock a few easy strokes. It’s not hard to tell how desperate he is for it, the wild look in his eyes something she’s only dreamed of. The kind of look that has her pinned against the wall, held down, fucked within an inch of her life. 

There’s a pull, her underwear being tugged aside, an edge of pain that’s not _quite_ biting into her skin and the easy glide of something being pressed against her opening. He has his cock held in his hand as he slides it back and forth gathering up slick before he presses and presses and fuck he’s bigger than his fingers, so much bigger. His cock head blunt and hard and wonderful as he pulls her thighs up over his hips and presses in slow and easy. She’s still too sated to really participate properly so settles for a locking her ankles behind his back enjoying the way he fills her leaving no area left that isn’t full of him. 

In this position, there’s no space between them, his forearms resting on the mattress beside her head. His breath lingers as he nuzzles his nose into the soft spot beneath her jaw scenting her there in an act that’s far too private for whatever this is. His hips rock slowly, large body quivering with barely-there restraint as his hands start to wander. They’re huge like the rest of him she realizes dizzily allowing him to position her wrists above her head until they’re both pinned beneath his hold. 

Closing her eyes she focuses on the motion of it, the way it feels, the way he feels. This man hovering above her, this alpha with no name. Angling her hips she marvels at the strangled groan that erupts from his throat and suddenly there are lips on her neck. Plush and warm and wet he whispers against her skin, “Such a perfect pussy, fucking made for this cock weren’t you?”

She wants to say yes, to cry out that she’s his but all words die on her tongue as he slowly drags out only to thrust back a bit harder. Each long motion done with such care until the force of his hips is pushing her up the bed. He has to scramble to hoist his knees under her thighs as she gives her hips a careful little swirl making his grip on her hands tighten, “tell me what you need,” his voice is strained, desperate. Not filled with dark promise as it had been before. He’s barely hanging on and that makes it all the sweeter when he captures her nipple between his lips and gives it a soft tug stealing her ‘ _you_ ’ from her lips. All she needs, all she wants is him, whatever he will give her, scraps of his soul will fill up the cracks left in the wake of her past mistakes. 

The pressure is dull, then sharp and then blissfully wet as his tongue swirls around the sensitive bud. Her chest flushed a rosy pink in the soft silver moonlight, “Wanna— ngh wanna feel you come—“ he manages to say, “wanna feel—fuck you’re so tight, how are you so tight? — Jesus fuck I’m not gonna last.” Rey can’t think beyond the feel of him, his tempo picking up. She can feel him, all of him, the way his thighs flex beneath her as he moves, the way his breathing falters, stuttering through muffled curses. 

“Sweetheart, fuck,” Each drag of his cock becomes a laborious thing tugging and pulling and stretching her. He’s stretching her!

How could she have forgotten about that small detail, his cock swelling around the base catching at the lip of her cunt as his hips slow and the pressure inside her builds, “Can I- Can I knot you?” 

Rey barely has time to respond, her horny hindbrain screaming _yes, yes, yes_ as he forces himself back in, “Fuck sweetheart, tell me now if you don’t want it.” He warns her but all she can do is whimper, ‘ _please_ ’ and ‘ _more_ ’, clawing at his arms, up his biceps tugging him closer, pulling them tight together. 

He falls against her with a groan, his pelvis bumping against her clit as he moves. Easy, languid thrusts that push and push until he can’t pull out anymore. He’s not fully gone but he’s on the brink of losing it, spilling inside her as it suddenly dawns on her that they never talked about birth control or anything that might be deemed a safe sex conversation. She tucks that information away in the back of her mind, a ‘ _bring_ _up when it’s over_ ’ sort of conversation. Too little too late at this point so why not hold on and enjoy. It’s reckless and stupid but all she can think about is the way his cock feels lodged deep inside her. The grinding of his pelvis edging her forward as his lips find her neck. His kisses are slow easy things, a warm tongue wet against her gland as he closes his lips and sucks on it hard. His teeth scrape and Rey shudders whimpering “More, so close.” 

He sets a brutal pace, hammering into her without being able to pull out, no more words, just breathless gasping and high pitched whines. His movement within her a slow sort of frantic. A pace she’d never known existed before, allowing her the peace of mind to revel in the feel of his lips. A soft rain of kisses across her chest, along her neck and jaw until his lips capture her own. He swallows every gasp and groan inhaling deeply. The moment stretches on a heartbeat and then two as his slow and steady grind builds her up to a fevered pitch. 

The pull and push of his hips is deliriously pleasurable as he groans, the pressure of his cock building, pulsing within her, “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he mutters against her cheek, “M’gonna come.” 

Rey can’t help but dig her nails into his back as her orgasm erupts from within her like wildfire. One minute she’s teetering and the next she’s being burned alive. It coils in her belly before dancing along her spine making her feel like she’s being fucked through an inferno. A scream rips from her throat, visceral and loud as Ben hollers out one last ‘ _fuck_ ’ and his teeth sink into her shoulder. Warmth explodes through her used and battered muscles flaring down her arms, her legs, working distally out of her body as the cock inside her pulses and twitches. 

She laughs, she cries, she clings to him for dear life as her orgasm flutters through her like a leaf on the wind. It’s blissfully euphoric, the steady pulse of his cock spurting load after a load of cum into her body. Feeding her his seed like she’s starving for it and maybe she is. She feels delirious, almost giddy as the coppery scent of blood hits her nose and for a brief moment, she wonders if something might have torn. Was he too rough in the end? Was his knot too much for her to take safely? Not likely, her omega body was built to handle this and so much more. 

There’s a heat slowly dribbling down her thighs where the two of them lie joined together. Slick and seed seeping out making her whimper in protest. She’s not in heat but for some reason, her omega brain laments the loss of any potential children they might have made. The alpha’s tongue is a balm against the sweet burn at her neck. The one that feels sort of thick and funny ticking something deep in her core that has never been touched by another human being before. It whispers promises of security and forever making Rey still as the realization dawns on her. His mouth, his deliciously sinful mouth and those pillow soft lips are working against her skin like a babe at its mothers breast suckling the broken flesh right where her mating gland should be.

Panic surges through her as the haze of her orgasm lifts leaving her stuck to this man she doesn’t know while emotions far too foreign for her to process crash through her. Curiosity and lazy happiness, followed by a careful prodding, like someone has tied a string around her middle and is testing its give. He moves and she moves following along on an invisible wire. His face both beautiful and broken as the world slowly slips back into focus and they’re no longer two people driven by some carnal need but people with jobs and lives outside of one another. 

“Fuck,” he curses as panic turns to fear and Rey is left to muddle through the drowning sensation of ‘ _what have I done?_ ’ mixed up with her own, ‘ _alpha doesn’t want me_ ’. She’s being abandoned again, left behind, tossed aside. It’s irrational and foolish but it hurts so viciously it feels like a slap across the face. 

Tears well at the corners of her eyes as the alpha watches in wide-eyed wonder, shifting on top of her to give her some space. He’s cursing beneath his breath, kind enough to keep his building panic to a healthy simmer because she can feel it. All of it. His feelings sticking her hers. Thick and strange and tangled together making it hard to tell where her mind ends and his begins. 

“I- I-” He tries but all she can do is sob striking at his shoulder as she hisses out words like, ‘ _beast_ ’ and ‘ _cruel_ ’ and ‘ _why why why?_ ’ His need to answer sits thick on her tongue making her want to slap him again because he bit her. He fucking bit her and now she’s trapped and he’s going to throw her away.

“I’m not, I won’t.” but he can’t promise her that. She doesn’t even want him, not really. Maybe the idea of him is appealing in some way, the promise of forevers and a family and never having the be alone again. But she is, alone that is. Even now, trapped beneath him struggling for space. Every movement tugging at her cunt unleashing another wave of cum into her awaiting womb. 

He grits his teeth and whimpers, closing his eyes as he empties into her in another wave. Stuttered apologies falling upon her tears because now she’s mated to an absolute stranger and she’s never felt more alone in all her life. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there we go, let me know what you think and come say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	2. Into your heart I'll beat again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No one will want her now that she's marked but sometimes she catches herself wondering if he might, love her that is. The alpha she’d run from, the one she had left. Could he love her?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy, the reception this got was... insane. Thank you, thank you, thank you.  
> I've updated the Tags so please read them. I'll put the CW in the endnotes for this chapter so check that out too.  
> Full disclosure I have no idea how long this will be, not long, I have it set at 3 chapters but it'll likely be closer to 5

Panicked, fearful, lost, skittish, sick. All feelings that have swirled in her gut, raking down her throat to the point of suffocation ever since she left her alpha. No, not _her_ alpha, he can’t be hers. He’ll never be hers. He was only supposed to be a one-night thing. A thrill, something she allowed herself because never in her life had she done something so reckless and now shes painfully reminded why exactly that is.

Because people make life more complicated and needing them even more so.

Life is… strange now. It had been dull before humdrum, practical, predictable even. That was until she got the phone call from her doctor asking her to come in so they could discuss her latest pap test. It was nothing out of the ordinary, abnormal tests happen to people all the time only then there was the biopsy and the concern that things weren’t quite looking right. Ultrasounds and speculation and words being thrown around that Rey couldn’t quite wrap her head around. It could be this or it could be that but they wouldn’t know for certain until they got the test results back but not to worry she’s young and healthy, both things working to her advantage.

The waiting game had been the worst, days where she was left reflecting on her life and all the things she’d missed out on because she was too busy working. Things she would never experience. She’d never really been in love, never had a chance to travel. She’d never tried sushi or gone white water rafting, never owned a pet, never had a one night stand, or learned how to poach an egg. Well… now she can scratch one of those things off her list. 

She’d fallen through the cracks at first, appointments lost, test results misplaced. At one point they had her mixed up with someone else and for a total of ten minutes, she thought she was dying. _Actually_ dying. Only there chart had gotten mixed up with someone else and she clearly wasn’t a forty-three-year-old female who had already gone through a double mastectomy. They were still looking into how such a grievous error could have been made, someone was responsible and Rey had gotten an apology the size of Corellia with the undertone of ‘ _please don’t sue_ ’.

In the end, it was a tumour on her cervix, benign thank god, just something that happens.

She would need to be seen in another six months to make sure everything was a-ok but the scare was over. That day she quit her job, the soul-sucking one that she worked at ten hours a day six days a week plus more over time than she dared ever admit. Instead, she applied for a job at a local coffee shop and bookstore. It was an adorable little place owned by a middle-aged man named Luke who had lost his hand… well Rey wasn’t entirely sure how it actually happened. She’d been told everything from ‘ _got it caught in a cookie jar_ ’ to ‘ _got it bitten off by a shark_ ’ every tale more outlandish than the next.

She liked Luke though, as far as bosses went he was top-notch, and as a human being he was pretty stellar too. He liked to read more than anything else and could often be found hidden in the back stacks with a book perched in his lap. He stayed there to help people he said but more often than not when Rey stumbled on him midday he was fast asleep with an open book propped against his chest. 

Her job had started in the coffee shop, she could make a mean chai tea latte now but eventually Luke moved her over into the books. She catalogued and organized everything from front to back and when that was done she organized the stock just for fun. Luke would tease her relentlessly about her dedication but at the end of the day, she knew he was grateful. Eventually, she was put in charge of ordering and then scheduling and before she knew it she was running the place leaving Luke with nothing to do but enjoy his old books. 

On top of the new job, Rey found herself taking up new hobbies, dance classes, jujitsu training, cooking, pottery. She tried anything and everything that she could find to sink her teeth into. Luke even taught her how to poach an egg and then how to make cheesecake citing it was easier with two hands and he really had a hankering. 

She lived, made new friends, reconnected with old ones. Finn, a boy she had been in foster care with lived in the area and he had convinced her to come out with him, his boyfriend, and two of their friends one evening. They went to a bar in the lower hub of Chandrilla and that was where Rey had met him, the alpha. The one who wasn’t hers but was. 

She could feel him even now as though he’d managed to crawl beneath her skin and take of residence in her soul. Fleeting things, like a craving for sausage when she’d decided weeks ago she was going to be a vegetarian. Need and desire and loneliness too, amplified by her own built into a monstrous thing. His thoughts whispering to her when she lies in bed at night praying for sleep. Thoughts about _her_ , where she was and if she was well. Quiet questions that begged for answers, answers she ignored as they built up beneath her sternum, words that demanded to be said out loud or thought. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing because he’d take away the one thing she’d wanted more than anything else. One first she craved that she never knew she wanted. A first love. 

No one will want her now that she's marked but sometimes she catches herself wondering if he might, love her that is. The alpha she’d run from, the one she had left. Could he love her? She’ll never know now, his affection tainted by this infernal connection, the one that left her wanting and desperate and hot on evenings he took himself in hand and cried out for her as he came. It was thicker then, the connection, like a string had been tied around the two of them and plucked hard. It left her flustered, her hand sneaking beneath the sheets to seek out her own release. One that came with a quiet gasp and ended with a purr humming along the wire between them. A soft ‘ _good girl_ ’ fluttering through her mind in his deep baritone. 

She hadn’t even gotten his name. The minute his knot loosened she was gone, pulling on her dress and bolting for the door as though the devil himself was nipping at her heels. He followed her into the hallway calling for her to wait but she was at the elevator and gone. The image of him standing there in nothing more than black boxer briefs looking utterly distraught the last thing she’ll ever remember of him. 

Well, that and his scent because try as she might she can’t scrub it from her skin. She took shower after shower using every sort of body wash and shampoo she could think of to no avail. Even the one designed to block scent didn’t quite work as intended. They covered it up sure, coated her in a chemical haze that made her sneeze but even still there beneath it all was him and her… _them._ Together meshed in a way that she shouldn’t find comforting and yet the loss of it hurt. Having it buried beneath layers upon layers of scent blocking sprays makes Rey sick to her stomach so she keeps that small part of him. 

If anyone notices they don’t say a word. She takes her suppressants as mandated by the government and life goes on as normal as it can. Only will it ever really be normal ever again?

“You ok kid?” Luke’s voice breaks through the bustle of the crowd. A group full of middle-aged woman make their way to the cafe clad in tight black lycra with yoga mats slung over their shoulders. Yoga, there’s a thought, maybe that would calm her down some, make her feel a little less like she’s going crazy, “Earth to Rey,” he pushes, waving a hand in front of her face as she stands staring out over the top floor look off. 

“What? Yeah, sorry. Yeah. I’m ok.” 

Luke sort of grimaces, it’s not a full grimace but it’s not a scowl either. It’s this weird thing he does where his bottom lip pops out and he rubs at his chin like he’s thinking, “Naw, doesn’t stick. What’s going on sugar tits?” 

Rey makes a face, brows scrunched, “You know that’s sexual harassment right?”

A shrug, “You know I’m gay right?”

“Makes it no less harassment,” Pushing away from the railing Rey sets to the task of putting away the orphans. Books left at the cash or abandoned somewhere in the store because people decided last minute they didn’t want to purchase them. It’s an easy yet menial task that she enjoys because it gets her away from the register. Kay is better with the customers, Rey is better with the literature. The jokes write themselves. 

“Alright, my little omegaladon.”

“Cringeworthy Luke,” Rey brushes passed him placing a book back on the shelf high above her head, “In bad taste to mention someone's designation too. More harassment. Why can’t you just call me by my name?”

“Don’t wanna,” like a child stomping his feet Luke follows along. He’s in his classic khakis and cable knit sweater with a pair of knit slippers worn comfortably on his feet. An old man through and through. “I like you too much to call you by your name, you’re special to me,” it hits strange, like a twang on a guitar that’s been left to sit out of tune. 

Quietly his eyes take her in, the sheer dark hose and knee-high brown suede boots, the grey, brown, and red plaid pleated skirt that sits high on her waist and the rich rustic brown knit turtle neck that she’s wearing to cover up the still healing bite mark that she isn’t ready to face. It’s very fall chic except for her earrings. She hasn’t reached the point where she’s ready to retire them for the season so they sit against her lobes screaming ‘ _look at me I’m out of place_ ’

“Sunflower,” Luke says with a grin and admittedly Rey doesn’t find she hates it.

“Fine, if it’ll make you happy.” 

“It will,” simple, good maybe it’ll get him off her case, “But I’m not concerned with what makes me happy right now pumpkin,” _another_ nickname… great, “I’m worried about what’ll make _you_ happy.” A pause as she goes to open her mouth, retort on the tip of her tongue, “Beyond me dropping the nicknames, that’s not happening. What’s going on with you I’m worried. You haven’t been by for our weekly cookout and Jannah said you didn’t go to your last pottery class either.” 

Rey sighs, her back to her boss who admittedly has been more like a father figure than anyone else in her life ever has. She doesn’t want to lie but she can’t tell him the truth either. It’s too personal, too shameful, it would only disappoint him. “M’fine Luke,” she tries her best smile, the megawatt one that always gets him off her case. It lands with a three out of ten and the judges are not impressed.

“Nice try, want another chance or shall we just go straight to the part where you tell me what's going on?”

Heat burns it’s way up her neck, Luke’s gaze settling upon her like a stormcloud, blues and greens and greys crushed together like shattered ice. A fathomless stare that penetrates into her very soul. He can read people like a book, and right now he’s settling into her curiously like a copy of one of his Sherlock Holmes novels ready to solve the mystery, “I just haven’t been feeling well lately. A little nervous about my doctor's appointment coming up in a few weeks,” Luke looks like he might be ready to ask something else when Rey hastily adds, “You know, lady stuff,” and the nosy old codger begrudgingly backs down. 

“All routine stuff I hope?”

Focusing on her task at hand Rey brushes off the question easily, “Just the annual stuff, making sure everything is as it should be.”

“And that’s all it is?”

“That’s all Luke, don’t worry. I’ll come by tonight if you want, we can make butter chicken, I’ll pick up some nan bread?”

Food is always a good way to distract Luke and it works like a charm. He’s laughing and telling her a story about old Man Yoda and his latest manuscript as Rey continues to place books back on the shelf. He shuffles alongside her for the rest of the row handing her books as they chat, or he chats and she listens. It’s nice to have a break from the whispers in her head, Luke’s voice giving her something else to focus on.

When the last book is placed Luke offers Rey a kind smile and a hand on her shoulder, “Why don't you take the rest of the day off sweetheart. It’s not busy, Kay and I can manage on our own.”

“You sure?”

“You got the schedule done?” Rey nods and Luke gives her arm a kind squeeze, “Yeah, get out of here. It’s a nice day. Go for a talk in the park or something you’re looking a little pale.”  
Normally she’d bristle at the implication but her mind is too wary and honestly, she knows she’s looked better, “Seven?”

“Seven,” Luke confirms and without another word Rey throws her arms around his neck, her chin coming to rest upon his shoulder. She whispers her thanks earning her a soft chuckle and a returned embrace before she slips off to the break room to grab her purse. She sneaks out the back to avoid Kay and any questions, setting off down the street with a bounce in her step. 

The autumn air is fresh in her lungs, cool and bright and utterly invigorating. Her apartment is ten minutes by bus for a thirty-five-minute walk and today is too nice a day to spend it sitting on a bus amidst other people's odours. 

The walk will be good, it’ll clear her head. 

Why then does it feel like she’s walking through cobwebs?

Each step taken is slower, more forced until she’s standing on the sidewalk on the corner of Wellington and Patterson feeling oddly alone and fearful. ‘ _Where are you?_ ’ surges through her brain making her shudder. Long icy fingertips stroke along her spine until she sees him. He’s standing there on the other side of the street staring at her. 

It was only one night and she knows it’s him without question because her body cries out in relief the minute their eyes meet. As though he’s the answer to everything she’s been missing these last few weeks. The reason for so many things she’ll never truly admit to herself. Like why she never went to the pharmacy to get plan B as she should have. Because her stupid mated omega brain couldn’t bare the thought destroying any chance of a family they might have. 

In the end, it hadn’t mattered, her period had come and saved her from having to face that monumental fuck up. Could he feel it? The fear she’s experienced, the elation, the sadness that followed that she drown in Haggendas and cheesy romcoms. Did he know she was relieved and disappointed all at the same time? Would he be disappointed in her for not being able to do the one simple thing that omega’s were put on the earth to do? Procreate and serve. A designation born into slavery the minute they present. 

She watches him watching her, their body language a mirror image of one another. When she steps, he shifts. His body angled so that he might dart out if she were to bolt. She's prey to him, like a doe being watched by a wolf only this wolf has already had his fangs in her hide. 

When she finally finds the courage to move, he breaks out in a sprint making her heart leap up into her chest. He barrels through traffic and it’s all she can do to watch as he closes in on her. Fifty feet, thirty, twenty and he’s banging his fist on the hood of a yellow taxi while the driver blares his horn. The noise startles her to waking and she’s suddenly very aware of the potential danger she’s in. She has no idea what he wants from her only that he can take it and no legal system in the world will deny him. 

For all intents and purposes, she is _his_ , a tight wet hole for him to fill. She has no rights now, no individuality, she’s simply his omega and that makes her panic. 

That makes her run. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: brief mentions of illness/tumour, a medical mix up and the panic that brings
> 
> This chapter was more of a set up for the next one but let me know what you think lovelies! and be sure to come and say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	3. Lover be good to me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Why are you afraid of me?”
> 
> “Because you’re an alpha.”
> 
> “Your alpha, I would never hurt you,” there’s a truth that rings through his words. A feeling of warmth fluttering softly within her ribcage as she allows the words to settle over her softly. She wants them to be true and for a minute maybe she even believes them but he’s grinding his erection into her ass as he pins her to a wall. If he were honest he would let her go

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've taken some liberties with omegaverse biology in this, hope you enjoy it. It's a lot of smut. Mostly it's just smut.  
> CW's in the endnotes.

Running it turns out is a very bad idea because the thought of putting space between them makes Rey feel physically ill. Bile burbles within her stomach as her mouth waters and her purse pounds against her side. Her low heels clack against the sidewalk as she takes a corner too sharp and collides with a man in a clown suit holding up a spinning arrow. The clown groans and swears as Rey knocks his billboard to the ground and barrels on without a care.

Behind her, she can hear her alpha calling out after her. His voice is still deep but it sounds strained and laced with full-blown panic. It tickles the back of her mind making her legs feel heavy and stiff, her body protesting the movement with every unbearable step that she takes bringing her further and further away from him. 

He’ll take care of her, her hindbrain purrs. He wants to _protect_ her, the problem is, at what cost? Would he put her in a gilded cage, make her wear one of those ridiculous collars. The kind that are marketed as jewelry but really just shows where an omega’s place truly is. At the heel of their alpha. A whipped dog made to mind. 

Rey runs until her lungs burn and her mind is blank because even in the heat of her fleeing she feels him calling her begging her to stop. His body, every ounce of his being aching for her to the point that it makes her knees buckle and she finally collapses against the hard stone steps of an elegant looking brownstone. The cold bites through her pantyhose, the rocky surface tearing at the delicate fabric leaving her with bloody knees and pebble dented palms.

He’s on her in a matter of minutes but there’s no more fight left in her quaking body. Her lungs gasp for air, body hunched over trying to right herself. Trying to make the world feel right again. It isn’t until his hand reaches for hers. Not until his fingers slide over her wrist that everything starts to calm.

The effect is immediate and it’s both fantastic and utterly terrifying all at the same time, “Little one, sweetheart please,” the term of endearment makes her skin feel hot. It’s too personal, too close. He doesn't _know_ her like that, he’s not _allowed_ to— but he is. He can have whatever he wants. 

“Please leave me alone,” she all but cries, her shoulders trembling but she doesn’t pull away. She doesn’t try for space because she knows if she struggles he’ll fight. It’s what they do after all. Alphas. They take and they take and they take. If she ran she would be nothing more than prey to him and Rey refuses to give him the satisfaction of another hunt. 

He’s as winded as she is she realizes with a small pang of pride. She made him work for it. Good, because fuck him. Fuck him for taking her choice away from her, for stealing her freedom with no remorse at all. 

“I can’t,” his fingers twitch and he's tugging her, helping her up. He hisses when he sees the state of her knees. Black tights now ruined, knees bloody. She’s hurt and he can’t stand it. She watches his eyes, pupils blown wide as he takes in her appearance. He seems to struggle over the right course of action but settles on guiding her to sit on the steps of this poor stranger's home. His briefcase, an expensive but worn-looking brown thing is set down beside her and for a moment, and for once this seems like a normal course of action. Like it’s something they’ve done before. 

Clumsily she’s hurt herself and her doting alpha is there to swoop in and make sure his sweet little omega is ok. It could be normal if she let it, this thing between them. hundreds like them are registered every day across the country. Mated A and O pairs that are celebrated by the news. A perfect match in every way, biologically compatible and totally in love. Aren’t they lucky? It’s the spin non-demi humans put on things to make themselves feel better about what’s really happening. 

It’s ok when a fifteen-year-old omega female is mated to a forty-year-old alpha male. It’s biology after all. Never mind the psychological ramifications that such a pair might have on the minor involved. Biology supersedes common sense making it easy to take advantage of a population of minorities who are already at a physical disadvantage. 

Omega’s are softer, kinder, warmer creatures who were born to be the ultimate nurturers. They’re fierce when backed into a corner but one alpha command and their spine is gone, bent to the will of whoever has the stones to try it. It’s supposed to be illegal but cases have been made where a command has been necessary. Claiming they were trying to save the poor omega’s life... 

Why hasn’t he tried that yet? 

This alpha male with his dark hair worn long, not cropped short the way most do. His eyes are softer too, the color of chocolate and caramel melted in the sun. He has the body of an alpha, tall, strong, harsh edges and fine lines but his facial features, though striking, are not what one might expect. There’s no chiselled jaw, sharp cheekbones or harsh brow. His mouth is soft and sweet, plush the way she would expect an omega’s mouth to be. She remembers it well because when he kissed her it felt like he was trying to memorize every aspect of her body with his lips alone. 

“Are you ok?” She blinks at him, eyes wide, astonished by the soft tone in his voice, the way he acts like she didn’t just run four straight city blocks just to escape him. She hisses as his thumbs slide softly over the hole in her tights, his touch faltering a moment as though he’s afraid to continue. When she doesn’t react he leans closer, his breath ghosting across the torn flesh of her kneecap. It’s just a scrape but it burns and then his tongue is there pressed softly against her skin. It's like a kiss, warm and sweet but exhilarating too, moving in soft kittenish strokes. 

Her brain fumbles with the information drowning in the sensation as emotions build up within her. Confusion, happiness, pride, desire. A well of feelings that swirl around her in a vortex of hypersensitivity. It’s her but it’s him too as she tries desperately to separate the mix of it all into neatly made boxes. 

His tongue works diligently, a warm press, saliva coating her skin until the sting is more of a buzz and she’s no longer bleeding. Her alpha wipes his spit damp mouth on the back of his knuckles as he stares helplessly at the wound. The skin is slowly knitting back together, a wet scab forming where it was once raw and bloody moments before. He places a kiss over the area tenderly before sliding back onto his feet in an attempt, she realizes, at giving her space. 

Alpha’s aren't supposed to be like this, are they? She only knows a few and they are nothing like this man. _Her_ alpha. The one who’s giving a shy sort of smile as he rubs a massive hand up the back of his neck, “Why did you run from me?” 

“I—“ swallowing hard she stares up at him and then down at her knee, he did that. Their connection did that. Why then if it was so magical did she feel the need to run from him even now? 

“I don’t even know your name.”

“Rey,” she offers it to him without any thought on the matter, as though it was his in the first place. Something she was merely holding onto until he was ready to take it back.

The alpha, her alpha, smiles, “S’pretty name,” he offers her sweetly one foot resting against the second step just below the one she's sitting on, the other remaining firmly planted on the ground. It cages her in making her feel small, fearful, ready to run again, “I’m Ben.” 

Ben, Ben, her alpha’s name is Ben. Ben with the warm eyes, Ben with the kind smile, Ben with the cock that made her scream and come and come and come. Ben who bit her without permission, who stole her right to make the choice herself. And, maybe once upon a time, she would have chosen him. Dark and beautiful and strong but she’ll never know because now he’s all she can feel. The flutter of something beneath her skin, the presence of another mind rubbing against her consciousness. The awareness of someone else’s thoughts, their feelings. _His_ feelings because they are joined now.

The panic starts to build again, pushing against her chest, forcing her beneath him. Submit, it tells her, submit. Submit, submit, submit. Give him your belly, your neck, your cunt. Let him take what he wants, fill you with his cum until he’s finished and there’s nothing left, no place sacred anymore because he will have had it all. Your mouth, your throat, your asshole too if he wants it. 

She watches his eyes, _Ben’s_ eyes widen, his nostrils flare but he’s too late, she’s gone again. She stumbles down off the stoop pushing him aside. His body is a firm weight that she merely buffets against and plunges forward into the afternoon sun. She doesn’t know where she’s going, what direction is which only that he’s behind her and so she has to keep moving forward. She feels as well as hears his growl, a deep vibration that flutters against her ribcage. He needs her, he wants her. She has become the prey and he is the hunter.

Down an alleyway, behind a row of buildings, ducking beneath a broken fence, one that's been clipped or ripped or torn apart. Her sweater snags on a piece of cut wire tearing open the sleeve and delicate flesh beneath. She’s bleeding again, he’ll like that she’s sure. A wounded animal for him to pounce on. 

Behind her he struggles, calling out her name as his body, too large for the narrow corridors bangs into garbage cans and iron doors. He needs her, she can feel it, he needs her like nothing she’s ever felt before in her life. A raw and visceral thing that erupts in her belly making her want to press her knees together. Slick saturates her underwear trickling down her inner thighs and still she runs. Her heartbeat hammers a frantic staccato rhythm as the world around her tunnels. Her lungs struggle to haul in oxygen, her vision grows fuzzy and he’s here, so close she can almost taste him.

Omega’s weren’t built for this sort of exertion and honestly, if she hadn’t spent most of her life running she might have given up long before now but she’s close. Freedom, the concept of at least is just there, close enough she can touch it. 

His body is a solid mass that pushes her against the cold brick of the nearby building. They’re in an alleyway beneath a fire escape, the ladder dangling just out of reach. There’s no escape here. The road beyond obscured by a heavy metal dumpster that smells like day-old kitty litter and eggs. It doesn’t matter though, none of it matters because he’s there, pinning her down and she hates it and she loves it and she needs to get away. 

It’s not his arms that hold her steady, it’s his body, his hips pressed into the swell of her ass. Large hands steady him against the brick on either side of her head as she tucks her chin and presses her forehead against the cool stone. His breathing is heavy, then again so is hers, leaning against her forearms she keeps folded beneath her, trying to make herself as small as she can. 

A sharp intake of air and his nose presses into the bony landmark at the top of her spine, the one that separates her beck and neck. He nuzzles against her, slow and easy breathing her in. Like a fine wine that deserves to be savoured. “You smell so fucking good,” he practically growls, his tone altered, deeper, dangerous in a way it hadn’t been before, “Why did you run from me? Did you like being chased?” 

An accusation spat out like she’s asking to get fucked. Like she’s simply toying with him now and not running for her life. It’s a game to him, like they’re simply playing a hand of poker. Only for Rey, it’s more like Russian roulette. Spin the barrel and pull the trigger because any move could be the wrong one, “Please let me go,” she whimpers but her thighs tell another story. One of need and desperation that she wishes desperately she could override. His body does things to her, makes her feel things she’s never known possible. 

A finger trails along her neck, tugging her hair free from the braid she hastily wove this morning. It tumbles in loose waves around her neck which the alpha, _Ben_ , buries his nose into. She can feel his purr against her back, his cock in his trousers stiffening against her backside, “Why are you afraid of me?”

“Because you’re an alpha.”

“Your alpha, I would never hurt you,” there’s a truth that rings through his words. A feeling of warmth fluttering softly within her ribcage as she allows the words to settle over her softly. She wants them to be true and for a minute maybe she even believes them but he’s grinding his erection into her ass as he pins her to a wall. If he were honest he would let her go, “Please little one,” a breath, his mouth on her neck, lips trailing sugar sweet kisses across her skin until he hits her mating gland that’s already been marked by his teeth. He stares at it reverently before inhaling deeply, sucking in the scent of her, of them that’s darkest and most finite there. “Rey, please.”

His plea sounds so broken, his words a soft tremor spoken against her skin in the privacy of their alleyway. “Rey,” a whimper and his hands are on her, roving down her sides along her hips until he’s rucking up her skirt exposing her arse to the air. Her pantyhose is wet making the cool nip all the more noticeable as a knee pushes her legs apart just a little, “Please my sweet little one, my beautiful darling girl,” he’s devolved into begging, his hand disappearing between her legs to rub delicately against the area where she’s most saturated. The apex of her thighs, “Fuck, I’ve missed you.”

Impossible, “You don’t know me,” She tries but it’s hard to find the words, his fingers pushing, stroking. 

“But I do,” he simpers, “I know you like it slow and light with a build-up of pressure when you do this yourself but when you’re with someone else you like the feel of something breaching this pretty little hole. I know that your clit is so sensitive that it can be hard to come with too much stimulation so you need it teased,” to emphasize his point he draws back his attention stroking a line through her lips that he's managed to press open through her panties. He drags it, slow and heavy, lessening and lessening until it’s a feather-light swirl around her clit that has her shouldering beneath him. 

“I know you haven’t felt right since that night but I suppose that’s unfair because I haven’t either. Empty inside,” he pushes, pushes, pushes and her pantyhose rips making space for him to probe at her bare flesh, “I don’t mean just this beautiful little cunt either,” voice gone dark as he bites her neck and forces the gusset of her panties aside. It’s seconds before he’s breaching her, two strong fingers pushed knuckle deep working slow and easy. “I’ve felt so hollow, so fucking useless it makes me want to scream. Are you having trouble sleeping?” 

Rey nods because it’s too difficult to say the word _yes_. Like even that will take too much effort and she needs all her strength to hold herself upright, “I can’t fucking sleep, I toss and turn and when I do finally manage a few hours, you’re all that fills my dreams. The way you taste, the sweet little noises you make when you’re getting fucked,” Rey gasps as he trusts hard once, twice, and then a third time, stealing the breath from her lungs with each poignant movement, “Just like that, fuck I love it.” 

“I know,” He grumbles, his fingers gone from within her as he drops to his knees pulling with him her torn hose and undergarments. Uselessly saturated things that tear like tissue paper in his grasp. She barely registers that she’s standing bare from the waist down in a dirty alleyway between two brick buildings somewhere in the heart of downtown. It feels like something that should be important but his hands are palming her ass and he’s pushing her cheeks apart until all she can feel is the heat from his breath. It caresses her backside, his nose tickling her delicately puckered hole while his tongue searches out a sweeter source. The tip curls around her clit as the broader surface pushes her labia apart. He drinks her in, gathering her slick on his tongue with each pass, groaning into her ass, 

“I know,” he pushes, his words muffled by her flesh, “You can’t live without coffee,” another hot swipe, another curl of his tongue, “Because I cant—“ he groans out a muffled _fuck_ , and laps at her slick soaked core, “I can’t fucking stand it and it’s all that I crave.” He sounds utterly wrecked, lost on the taste of her, “Coffee and this,” another pass of his tongue and his nose probes in tighter pressing against her perineum.

She wants to tell him to stop but instead, she arches her back, moaning softly as his tongue works in teasing strokes against his clit. He devours her, ravenous, desperate, sloppy sounds echoing through the alleyway as he coats his face in her slick. In the world beyond life pushes forward, people laughing, sharing stories, cars honking, bike messengers hollering, none of them aware what’s happening a mere few feet away.

They wouldn’t get arrested, of course, A and O couples get off with a slap on the wrist over this sort of thing all the time. Slaves to their biology and all. It makes issues of assault much harder to prove when the victim is an omega. 

“You’re so fucking wet Rey,” his words are spoken against her cheek, he’s moved, changed positions again. Standing at her back, his hands stroking over the rounded globes of her arse. “Do you know what you taste like?” his wet lips brush her earlobe, he must not have bothered to wipe off his face. 

Shaking her head she presses her cheek against the rough brick taking in his profile. His face is coated from his nose down, slick dribbling over his throat, saturating his crisp white dress shirt and pretty navy blue tie. He looks like a four-year-old after a meal of spaghetti. “Fucking sunshine, you taste,” a kiss on her neck, open-mouthed and wet. He’s sucking on her mating glad she realizes making her feel weak in the knees. “Like sunshine,” 

What?

There’s a soft rustle of clothing, the ‘ _shick_ ’ of leather sliding through belt loops and the deafening sound of a zipper being tugged down. He’s going to fuck her she realizes, “You taste like fucking sunshine, like lemonade, bitter and sweet all at the same time. Like watermelon- sugary,” he’s wriggling against her, his thighs bumping against hers. Bare thighs. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. 

“Please,” she begs but she’s not entirely sure what for. 

“It’s ok, baby girl, I’ve got what you need right here,” the blunt tip of his cock head slides between her legs and it’s sweet blissful relief. Like someone has been holding her twisted in knots and they’ve finally, _finally_ let go. “Fuck, Rey.” He groans as the tip pushes passed the soft resistance met by tight muscles made pliant by her need. It throws him off course a moment, his thighs straining against her as he works slowly thrusting into her heat inch by agonizing inch, “I know,” he cries out, “I know that your toys haven't been enough for you. I know that you’ve thought of my cock as often as I’ve thought of your sweet little cunt.” Her traitorous body allows him another few inches and soon he's resting, flush against her back. “I know,” he pants, “I know you were sad when you started your period. I know you thought about—nngh fuuuuuck—“ rocking into her slowly she feels his hand slip beneath the hem of her sweater, warm palm and thick fingers holding her there, “about babies— _our_ babies.” 

She doesn’t want to hear it, these truths that no one else is supposed to know. Secrets she’s kept safe, held close, now falling from his lips because he knows. Fuck he _knows._

“I know you want a family, children, because you don’t want to be lonely anymore. Children who will love you but sweetheart,” his hips move easy and slow, the drag of his cock pulling out a blissfully decadent thing, almost as sweet as when he slowly sinks back in “I’ll love you too, I promise,” He whispers against her ear, “I promise I’ll give you babies. I’ll fill up your beautiful cunt with my cum. You want that don’t you.” it’s like he’s talking himself through it, amping himself up. A hand on her belly and another at her throat, a pressure, a hold, a warning. He’s claiming her, holding her still so he can take what he wants and fuck if she doesn’t love it. 

Being used by him, relinquishing control letting him take and take and take. He could love her, he said so, “Would you like that darling? My sweet omega doll?” 

Rey gasps, his hips snapping, stealing the answer from within her lungs. Her, “Yes, yes, yes,” falling through panted breathes and the sound of his hips slapping against her ass.

“Fucking beautiful, fucking perfect.” His praise strokes along her spine tugging at her consciousness, pulling hard on the reins her anxiety has leashed her with, “Made to take it— push back against me, fuck yourself on my cock.”

And she does, burying him inside her, stretching her out until it’s no longer too much but the edge of a delicious stretch. Her back arches, the hold on her neck trembling and tight, “More,” she needs it, the pressure that flirts with stealing her breath away. 

“More—“ he parrots curiously, “You want more? More what little one, more cock?” she arches her throat into his hand as Ben’s hips start to stutter.

“More—“ she urges, her eyes rolling back into her head as he squeezes her neck and then pulls away as though he’s been burned. He doesn’t seem to get it. 

His muttered, “Sorry”’s are a gentle contrast to his previous filthy words a, “Fuck— mmmhhmm” he groans as she whimpers, “Look at you— fucking look at you— so little— so fucking perfect. I can feel myself fucking you, can you feel that?” scrambling for her hand he presses it over her belly, the lower part beneath her navel. The light pressure of his hand on the back of hers is nice but not as nice as the pressure that builds. 

But all Rey can do is laugh through a moan hissing, “Put your hand on my throat.”

His thrusts slow a moment, brain clearly needing a moment to process the request, “You—“ 

“Yes— fuck— please.” Is that her? Are those words coming out of her mouth? 

It doesn’t matter because the pressure is back and she’s damn near soaring. It’s the perfect amount of too much and not enough. A broad pressure at her throat with a gentle squeeze that tightness along the side. Everything tingles, her brain flushed with color and sensation as he increases his pace, “You like that?” he growls and all she can do is whimper against his hold because _yes_ , she does, so much so, “Touch yourself for me, play with your clit while I fuck you. Some stranger in an alley, is that what you like?”

She shakes her head slightly, panic flaring bright. No, not a stranger, _her_ stranger, her alpha. 

“No, my sweet girl doesn’t want some stranger's cock does she?” She can feel her response vibrate against his hand making the sound come out strangled and weak, “She wants her alpha’s cock. Come on touch yourself little one, play with that pretty little clit.” 

Her hand slides down over the brick, the bite of rough stone against her hand blissfully sweet as he changes his angle and dips his hips deep. Ben has her held up by her throat while his other hand maintains a pressure over her belly. The palm of her hand meeting the graze of his cock moving inside her. 

“Tell me when you’re close,” he all but begs, her fingers stumbling over her clit, slipping lower to feel where he disappears inside her. Her thighs are a mess, his cock slick, balls pulled tight against them, “Gonna put a baby in you sweet girl. You want that?” and Rey can’t help but nod because nothing in the world sounds more lovely than that and still he barrels on, “You’d look so pretty, round little belly— ngghhh— fuuuuuck gonna fill you with my cum, we’re gonna make a family little one. You’re gonna come on my knot and I’m going to pump you so full that— that— fuck can’t wait to see you growing our baby.”

Edging her finger around in a tight circle she feels the slow pull of something deep in her belly. The warm coiling of a pressure that builds and builds making her muscles twitch and her toes curl within her boots. It comes slow, and steady until it’s there catching her off guard, “Nnnhh’gonna, Nnnh’gonna,” she cries and his hand is gone the pressure swept away in an orgasm that hits wild and fierce as oxygen and fire tear through her body. Rey slumps with a cry, her legs buckling beneath her as the alpha at her back, bites down against her shoulder. His own release a barely perceived thing but the knot that spreads her wide is not to be ignored. It burns and pulls as he buries himself deep, the throb of his cock and the steady hum of his teeth in her shoulder enough to push her through another small release.

Her pussy flutters around him, spasming against the pulse of his orgasm. He comes with a groan, his teeth breaking the skin of her mating glad again sending a wave of pleasure and adoration straight through to her core. 

She's laughing to herself, the situation so absurd. Reality a fickle creature as the world comes back into focus. Somewhere not far from where they stand, locked together in their post-coital haze someone yells at a pedestrian to get out of the way. A horn honks, someone curses and the world continues on. 

Ben throbs within her, a groan reverberating through his chest as another load of hot, sticky seed gushes into her awaiting womb. A baby, he promised her a baby. Her post-orgasm high makes it hard for her to do the math but there's’ no way it’ll take. She back peddles trying to figure out when her last period was. How long sperm can live in the body but each time she plucks at a thread it unravels and the only thing she can focus on is the way he feels inside her. 

“Need to move sweetheart.” He grunts, “Gonna be a minute before this goes down.” he pushes into her and they both moan. 

Honestly, she’s not entirely sure how it happens but they end up on the ground. She’s sitting in his lap, her thighs straddling his. Like this, he can hold onto her, wrap his arms around her from behind and cradle her against his chest. The position awards a friendly burn from her thighs but it’s worth it to feel him hold her like this. Like she’s something to be treasured. 

Every so often his fingers dance away, toying with her clit until he manages to steal another ripple of release from her body. She feels like she’s run a marathon and each spasm of her inner walls is like settling into a warm bed with a heated and weighted blanket. She could fall asleep like this, settled in a dirty alleyway next to a filthy dumpster that smells like someone's old pet excrement. 

After a while, she realizes he’s doing it on purpose. Every time her cunt contracts around him it tugs on his knot keeping him hard. Like he’s holding her hostage by using their designations against her. 

This, _this_ is the problem with alphas. 

“Stop, stop stop,” she bats his hand away and covers herself with her own two hands waiting for him to push back and take what he wants. Only he doesn’t. Instead, he settles back against the brick pulling her with him. He kisses her neck and hums a soft lullaby. One she can see him humming to their children. 

“I meant it you know.”

“What?”

“That I’ll love you. If you’ll let me that is.” His arms squeeze tight, nose nuzzling against the back of her neck. “I know you don’t believe me but I will.”

But when his knot is gone and her freedom is at hand Rey bolts to her feet. She grumbles her displeasure ripping away the pantyhose that hangs uselessly off her body. “This won't happen again.”

“What?”

“Us, this. We aren’t a thing.”

Hurt flickers across soft warm eyes, his mouth moving over words left unsaid, “We’re mated, Rey.”

“Against my will,” she barks and a part of her preens at the way he takes half a step back. Another part, a larger part, one that speaks of reason and truth tells her she’s being an idiot. He will love her, the one thing she’s wanted more than anything else. She could belong to him and he, in turn, could belong to her. He seems the type who would belong to a mate. Who would bring them coffee at work and surprise them with flowers. The kind of mate who would cry when told he was going to be a father and hold her hand through all of it, the good, the bad and everything in between.

It’s too much of a gamble, too much to ask. Too much to risk. So she turns and she runs, not the hard sprint she had forced from her body before but a quick jog. Space, she needs space and this time she’s sure he won’t follow her. He’ll let her go because he knows that she’s lying. He can feel it in his chest the same way she can. The flicker of hope. The flutter of something real. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Mentions of underage relationships  
> Dubiously consensual sex, she doesn't want to want it  
> Breeding kink  
> Praise kink  
> lots of talk of babies  
> breathplay  
> Lots of dirty talk  
> Rey running again  
> sex in an alley
> 
> Thanks for reading guys! Come say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	4. And every breath that I've been taken since you left feels like a waste on me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “And you have no feelings for this man at all?”
> 
> “Disdain, that’s a feeling right?”
> 
> His look of derision makes Rey laugh, shaking her head as she finds her attention back on the world outside, “What do you need kid?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW at the end

“Rey, I’m starting to get a little worried about you.”

She’s sitting in the coffee shop part of the bookstore in front of one of the big bay windows that’s been painted for the season. Brilliant leaves of reds and yellows and oranges decorate the surface with a large pumpkin drawn in the corner. Nothing over the top, nothing too tacky, enough to seem like they’ve made an effort but not so much as to seem overdone. Simplistic elegance. It’s Luke’s motto.

Luke takes his place in the seat across from her, his storm grey eyes twinkling curiously as he rests his hands against the table, his prosthetic covered mostly by the sleeve of his button-down knit sweater. “You don’t seem yourself.”

A dark part of her wants to quip back a sharp, ‘ _oh, and who do I seem like?_ ’ but instead she offers him a quiet smile and a kind, “I’m alright,” careful to avoid the word _fine_ and the litany of questions that word is likely to bring about. No one is ever really fine after all, “Just a little tired, that’s all.” It’s not a lie either. She’s been exhausted as of late. Her body aching with the change of the weather. 

“Tired hmm,” Luke nods, looking out the window for a moment as they lapse into a comfortable sort of silence. He’s going to push, she knows it because she’s come to know him, he’s just trying to figure out the best way to broach the subject. Whatever that subject might be. Either way, she’s fairly certain she’s not looking forward to it. “This tiredness have anything to do with that mark you’ve been trying so desperately to hide?” he doesn’t look away from the sidewalk outside and the people milling about. 

The mass populace dressed for the weather in pants and thick sweaters or long jackets and scarves. Not the thick kind that accompanies snow but the fashionable kind that accompanies pumpkin spiced lattes and adorable and ironically worn berets.

Scrambling to find the right words to say all Rey can do is huff a soft sigh, “No, that’s not a thing.” 

“Bullshit,” the harshness in Luke’s tone has a bite she’s not prepared for, “When were you planning on telling me?”

“I was kind of hoping I would never have to.” It’s hard to mask the bitterness, it’s saddled in exhaustion and nurtured but the roiling nausea that’s clawing at her insides. Nausea that she woke up with and hasn’t been able to shake no matter how many gravol she’s managed to toss back. 

Luke’s tone when he says her name is harsh, the “Rey!” Drawing attention from a table close by. He’s upset about something but sad too, maybe or it might be concern. It’s hard to tell, his brow drawn in a curious line, mouth set in a grimace, “You mated and you thought you wouldn't need to tell me? Have you registered? Is he,” a pause, “Are _they_ ok if you keep working?” 

Because it’s common for mated omegas to find a place in the home. Most fall pregnant within the first two months of the bite. The likelihood of conception heightened the more compatible the A and O pair is. It’s a biological fact, something drilled into omega’s from the moment they present. They’re rare, rarer than alpha’s, though they’ve become increasingly harder to come by as well. Less and less A and O pairings happen every year. Omegas are able to hide themselves away with the right dosage of blockers. Some even go so far as to have their glands removed entirely. It’s not a common practice because there are side effects, drastic ones too, but in some cases particularly ones where there are issues of abuse, Doctors can be found who will preform the surgery. 

It’s very clear to her how huge it is, this mating business but it’s not the celebration most non-Demi humans see it to be. Of course Luke would make a big deal about it. He’s probably worried that he’ll have to soon find her replacement. 

“I honestly could give two shits about how he feels about it if I’m being completely honest.”

Luke’s thick eyebrows disappear up into his shaggy fringe, “What?” it comes out slowly, like he's trying to be diplomatic but of course there’s an edge there too, like he wants to understand but he also wants to tell her she’s being an idiot. “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean, I don’t care how he feels about me working. I have a job and an apartment and life which he is not welcome in.” Simply stated. Fuck Alpha Ben and his alpha ideals. Whatever they might be. 

“Rey, your mate has rights—“

“No, no he does not,” She says a little too sharply, cutting Luke off with a pointedly agitated glare. “He did not have my permission to bite me, Luke. He simply took it against my will.”

“Sweetheart,” A softer tone, that docile kitten look, like she’s damaged goods now, _great_ , “Did he— did this alpha who bit you was he— did he- rape you?”

“What? No!” of course that would be the assumption. Heaven forbid she just want to have sex for the sake of having sex and since when did sex mean an invitation to forevers? “If you must know,” Luke nods because apparently, he must, “It was a casual hook up a couple of months back. I went out with Finn and Poe and Rose and Paige and I met this guy. He seemed nice enough, normal at least so we went back to his hotel room and—“ Luke looks uncomfortable and good because this wasn’t something that Rey really wanted to get into, “We had sex, obviously and when he was—“ Rey makes a rolling gesture with her hand hoping Luke will understand her meaning, “He bit me."

“Timeline adds up, have you seen him sense? Did he leave town?”

Rey shrugs, scooping up her coffee mug to allow the steam to waft up over her face. Camamiole and ginger tea, something to help with the stomach upset. Not her usual coffee, though her body is currently protesting the lack of that in her system, “No idea, I’ve only seen him once since then.”

Pieces slowly start sliding into place, Luke’s lips drawn in a curious ‘o’, “The day we were supposed to make butter chicken,” now he sees, and thank god for that, “How did he find you or did you find him?”

“We found each other I guess. I fell and scraped my knee and he—“ Rey scrunches her nose recalling the way his tongue felt lapping at the broken flesh, “He licked me which was weird but the scrape healed over and was gone by the next day.”

“A mates saliva can help heal. It seems weird I know, like something out of a science fiction novel but the whole concept of alphas and omega’s is a little strange if you ask me. The more compatible the pair the stronger the healing capability. In some cases when a mate get’s sick and needs blood or more drastic a kidney, their mate is always a match. The stronger the bond, the more compatible the mate, the quicker the healing time.”

“You seem to know an awful lot about this?” Luke’s hands fall back first against the table leaving his palms facing up, a quiet plea, a shrug, an offering of apology, “My sister is an alpha.”

“Your sister? A female alpha?”

“Rare I know, she's my twin actually.”

“And you’re—“ She waits, too afraid to out and out ask.

“I’m what? an alpha?” Luke laughs bitterly, “No, not an alpha,” there’s a soft sigh, the tail end of something sad that glitters in Luke’s eyes. He opens his mouth, pauses and then closes it again repeating the process until his shoulders sag and the air is thick with his blatant discomfort, “I am—“ Pausing Luke looks around, surveying their surroundings, “I was an omega.” 

Rey’s eyes dart to Luke’s neck and the scar that sits peeking out just below the neck of his t-shirt and sweater. A scar she hadn’t thought much about before. His natural scent is neutral something barely there and often covered by some musky old spice smell Rey has never really given much thought to. He’s Like, just Luke, kind and quiet and goofy but beyond that, there's nothing out of the norm when it comes to Luke Skywalker, “You had the surgery.”

A nod, “I did, a male omega and a homosexual. I’m sure you can imagine what my life was like. Leia tried to stand up for me but that only made it worse and my father—“ Luke shakes his head with a dismissive wave of his hand, “A story for another time I suppose. My point is, I have a pretty good grasp on how these things work. Like, for example,” sniffing the air around them careful not to draw too much attention, “I can still tell that your scent has changed though I can’t pick up much about him.” 

“Not much to tell you really,” Rolling her shoulders forwards Rey stretches out her limbs, drumming her fingers against the glossy tabletop, “He’s tall, dark hair, kind of odd-looking but pretty too…” She thinks of his eyes, soft and sweet but sharp and cunning too. Like a wolf looking for a belly rub. Like he would eat her up and she would thank him for it, that devilish tongue, the sweet bump of his aquiline nose, his ravenous appetite and culinary appreciation for the space between her legs. 

The memory of which sends an electric wiggle down along her spine, a fresh gush of slick welling in her panties. Somewhere near the doorway, someone bumps into a display sending a case of newly published Ventress Knight books clattering to the floor. Luke doesn’t look so Rey doesn’t either though there’s something tickling the back of her throat. Something in the air, a scent she cannot seem to shake, good coffee she decides because she hasn’t had a cup in days. 

“And you have no feelings for this man at all?” 

Luke, for all his foibles, has always been and will always be what Rey would consider a practical and yet hopeless romantic. He likes the idea of a happy ever after ending while not being foolish enough to think that one can attain such a creature without first putting in the work. He boasts love languages and sage advice like a relationship guru which is inevitably a little strange because Rey has never known him to take about partners past, present or future. Maybe now that makes just a little more sense

“Disdain, that’s a feeling right?”

His look of derision makes Rey laugh, shaking her head as she finds her attention back on the world outside, “What do you need kid?” It’s a loaded question but asked with such care that it’s hard to be cynical. She doesn’t want to, doesn’t have it in her to see it for anything more than the offer of a friend. Someone who cares and it’s nice really. Something she’s always kind of wished for but never quite knew how to attain, “I mean it, anything. You been to the doctor yet?” 

“Why would I go to the doctor?” The words come out bitter, as she turns back to find his stare honed in on her belly, “No,” she finally says after a minute, shifting in her seat. It feels like someone has poured spiders down her shirt, creepy and crawly up and down her spine. “He hasn’t hurt me, other than the bite of course and that’s healed.” 

Still, Luke’s eyes take their time, a casual observation like he’s trying to figure out how to tell her Santa isn’t real. Like there’s some omega secret that she hadn’t been privy to, a secret handshake, a sticker or maybe a pen she wasn’t given. Something that came along with a list of rules, the how-to guide with underlying fine print because it’s becoming abundantly clear that there’s something she’s missed. Some vital piece of information that—

“Uh— Hey— can we talk?”

The spider legs skitter up along her spine and through her hair as his voice coils around her brain stem. She doesn’t look up but she knows that it’s him. His scent, that cedarwood and rain smell has changed into something so tantalizing it makes her mouth water. The crisp scent of smoke and rich coffee beans drizzled over burning wood. A strangely appetizing aroma that makes Rey force her knees together to avoid getting the chair beneath her damp. 

Neither she nor Luke looks up, but she can see his outline in her periphery as Luke mouths, ‘ _you ok?_ ’ making her nod once before he turns and— and he stops. His jaw drops open, slack and lose, brow furrowed. Looking back and forth between she and her alpha he stops on her and mutters a soft, “Well shit. This is your alpha?”

“He’s not my—“

She starts at the same time the man at Luke’s back says, “Hello Uncle Luke.”

_ What? _

“Ben,” Luke offers with a nod, curt, friendly enough but strained, was that her fault? Did she do this to them? 

She doesn’t want to look at him, not yet anyway because looking at him makes him real and if she stares at her mug of lukewarm tea maybe, just maybe he’ll go away. Only he doesn’t and he’s not going to she realizes prying her eyes away from the tepid liquid to finally look him, Ben, in the eye. He looks… terrible. Absolutely awful. 

“You look like shit,” that too, thank you, Luke, Rey’s brain throws out absently as she takes in Ben and his haggard appearance. His hair is a mess— no, it's greasy she realizes with some bizarre satisfaction. He looks like he’s let himself go, the dark circles under his eyes look like they’ve been carved into his flesh. Deep purplish bruises set against alabaster skin that almost looks like he’s been fighting an acne break out. His skin is oily too, his forehead shiny and the creases around his nose lined with dark blackheads. 

It’s been what, five weeks now? maybe a little under two months and his looks have changed so drastically that at a passing glance he might even be someone else. Only he’ll never be anyone else, not to her. The omega in her mind, or maybe it’s the connection that flutters between them makes her chest ache. Being away from her did this to him and it’s something only she can fix. Mates aren’t meant to be separated but usually, it’s the omega that falls apart being kept away from their alpha and yet here he stands a ruin of a man. 

“Haven’t been sleeping,” Ben offers his uncle but his eyes are locked on hers. Warm honied cider, molten amber, the color of caramel begging her not to turn him away. Upon further inspection it becomes very evident that he simply doesn’t give a shit anymore, his suit is wrinkled and the buttons of his dress shirt beneath his tidy looking suit jacket are buttoned up wrong. Even his tie looks half-assed or perhaps he’s been working the knot loose in a frantic state of anxiety. He looks like he got dressed in the dark after pounding back half a quart of tequila. 

The noise Luke makes sounds a little like he understands but there’s a hard look in his eyes that says otherwise, “No,” he starts, tapping the back of his prosthetic hand against the table idly, “I don’t suppose you have.”

“Rey? Please?”

“Still with First Order?”

“What—?” Ben shakes his head, his hair matted in clumps, greasy strands falling into his eyes.

“You still working for that goblin Snoke?”

“Jesus Christ Luke, you ever think right now might not be the time for this?” The snap in Ben’s demeanour is enough to make Rey shudder. Her hands trembling against her coffee cup as the flicker of white-hot rage flares through her insides. Not hers, his. Unpredictable, unsteady, teetering on the brink of being a little unhinged. Luke to his credit seems utterly unphased but reaches out all the same and takes her hand, his fingers sliding over hers as he gives a soft squeeze. The _‘it’s ok, I’m here_ ’ a quiet promise between them.

“You ever think you should maybe learn to control yourself. You’re thirty-two years old and you bit someone Ben, without their permission. I know you know better than that. I know you were _raised_ better than that.”

Shame mixes with Rey’s own blend of apprehension and fear, Ben’s eyes flickering between her and Luke as though he expects her to come to his rescue. She doesn’t. She won’t. She can’t. She’s still not sure how she’s even supposed to feel about the whole thing beyond pissed off but now the nausea is back and she’s clutching her hand to her throat as though the pressure from the outside can hold it all down. Her mouth waters, her vision blurs when Luke releases her hand, pushing his chair back so that he’s standing between her and Ben. 

Ben must have said something because she’s never seen Luke so pissed off in her life. Almost an entire year of knowing him and this is a first, “Back up Benjamin,”

“This has nothing to do with you Luke and you damn well know it.” 

“Way I see it you’re way off base there kid,” Luke barely makes it passed Ben’s shoulder staring up at his nephew because fucking hell, her alpha is her bosses nephew. As if things can’t get any worse, “Do your parents know what you did to this poor girl?”

“She’s my mate—“ Ben seethes.

“Seems to me she never actually consented to that—“ back and forth they volley comments and insults. Verbal sparring that clears out nearby tables and has customers now giving them a wide birth. While Luke’s designation isn’t obvious at all Ben’s is. He screams alpha in every way, tall and volatile, and ready to attack, “So while I can’t do anything about that little chestnut, I can ask. Are. you. still. working. for Snoke? Because I will only tell you this once Ben Solo. This girl deserves better than whatever sorry excuse for a man you’re pretending to be. You wanna fuck a stranger you met in a bar, you go right ahead but do not for one instance pretend that you are in the right here with your mating bite Ben. You know—“ but Luke cuts off, pinching the bridge of his nose, eyes closed as he takes in a slow and steady breath until finally, he says, “I will not let you near her if I don’t feel like she’ll be safe with yo—“

“I was fired ok?” Rey jumps, her knees hitting the table bring the attention back to her, Ben’s eyes wide, horror-stricken things that soften the minute he realizes what he's done. He’s passed Luke in an instant, down on his knees, staring up at her. A place of submission, a moment of shock, pure unadulterated hope seeping through her body, a plea to be seen and that one is hard to place. Volatile emotions coalesce in her chest, hope, fear, a need to be loved, a desire for something, whatever she’s willing to give or is it her wanting more of this? She can’t tell where he ends and she begins. An emotional hurricane that swells and crashes and—

It hits her with a sudden rush, Ben’s hands scooping hers up just as she turns desperate for something, anything. It comes fast, there’s no stopping it. She can’t even stand because his chest is there at her knees and he’s pinning her with those hopeful puppy dog eyes. She wants to push the hair back off his face and examine him closer, to memorize every aspect of his features, instead, all she can do is turn her head and vomit into the potted plant that’s sitting on the window cill beside her. 

The blasted ferns that she hates with a passion, the ones Luke chose because they look nice and they’re low maintenance. Well, take that you horrible green bush. She feels the muscles of her stomach contract as another wave hits her and she’s throwing up the bagel she’s only just eaten. Food that’s barely had time to hit her stomach before it’s being hurtled back up and expelled from her body. 

There’s a scramble behind her, the warmth of Ben’s body gone, his presence missing making her inner omega cry out in dismay. She needs him. He can’t leave her. But everyone does.

His voice is at her ear, a hand on her back, Luke’s she realizes rubbing back and forth across the back of her shoulders while another hand, larger moves in confusing circles at her low back. She’s surrounded caged in by these two men throwing up in a plant in the middle of her place of work. _Great._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Luke talks about getting his glands removed and mentions his struggle with no detail 
> 
> Be sure to come and say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	5. I let myself want you, I let myself hope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “What is there to say?” Ben’s deep voice rumbles.
> 
> He’s testing Luke’s patience again, she can tell by the way Luke's shoulders stiffen like he's preparing himself for an argument that he’s already half had in his head, “Oh… I think there’s a lot about this situation that requires a discussion.”
> 
> “What’s the point Luke, it happened. We can’t change it—“
> 
> “You can’t keep living like this either—“ Luke interrupts, “neither of you can. It’s cruel.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just something quick to hold you over. I'm increasing the chapter count but I'm not sure by how much, two or three more than likely. I have it mapped out now. That push you're all waiting for but I don't know how long it'll run. I'm trying to keep the chapters shorter but the last one might be a bit bigger and the Epilogue is mostly written.  
> Thanks for all the love everyone. I'm glad you're enjoying their torment and struggle as much as I am!

With some gentle coaxing, Luke backs off and lets Ben take over. They’ve absconded with the pukey plant which has blessedly been deposited into a dumpster out back before and they retire to the small cubby that Luke calls his office. It’s a room walled with books, first editions and signed manuscripts that Luke downplays as though they’re nothing more than trinkets. Rey, however, knows otherwise. She’s catalogued each and every item in this room and knows their worth down to the cent. She also knows no one but she and Luke are allowed in here and now, apparently Ben as well.

After far too much fuss they’ve managed to find their places. Ben, currently sitting hunched over himself on the ratty old love seat that Lando dropped by a few months back, “This dads?” Ben asks absently, testing out the springs beneath his ass as large hands pluck over the upholstered fabric. 

“Yeah, Rey complains about me falling asleep in the stacks so Lando brought this by for me, I nap in here now,” he doesn’t, she still finds him passed out in the chairs that litter the back aisles but Rey doesn’t think to correct him, what would be the point?

The silence is unbearable, the air thick with a need for answers that suddenly no one is willing to give. They seem to be waiting for her to say something, maybe admit something that they think she might be keeping a secret. Ok, she hates blueberry muffins, she only eats them because for some reason Luke always orders an abundance and she hates seeing food go bad. It's just a sort of thing that she developed after having food withheld time and time again as a child. You gain a better appreciation of something when you've been denied it for long enough. Food became her thing and now even as an adult, she finds herself hoarding away canned goods and non-perishables just incase. 

Ben looks at her quickly, his curiosity tugging, twisting in her gut. He's grabbed a hold of something and is pulling on the thread curious as to where it might lead. She's given him something, a fear that no one knows about, a flicker of her former life that she's managed to keep hidden. Ben, to his credit, gives her space though as Luke ushers her into the old comfy chair at the other side of the desk. The one she sits in while pouring over inventory and schedules. Her chair really, with her lumbar support and her pens neatly lined up on the desk, “So, we gonna talk about this?” Luke asks quietly but Rey isn’t sure what exactly the _this_ is that he might be referring to. She has nothing to say. It’s all pretty straight forward and honestly, she’s keen to get home and get some rest. She needs some Gravol, ginger ale and a good long nap and she’ll be right as rain.

“What is there to say?” Ben’s deep voice rumbles. 

He’s testing Luke’s patience again, she can tell by the way Luke's shoulders stiffen like he's preparing himself for an argument that he’s already half had in his head, “Oh… I think there’s a lot about this situation that requires a discussion.”

“What’s the point Luke, it happened. We can’t change it—“

“You can’t keep living like this either—“ Luke interrupts, “neither of you can. It’s cruel.” It feels a little like sitting in the principal's office getting lectured for some childish prank. If only that were all this was, if only there were some way they could take it all back with a written apology or community service. Lines written on a chalkboard, ‘ _I will not go back to a strangers hotel room for unprotected sex_ ’. 

“Does Leia know?” 

Ben’s head jerks up quickly, eyes narrowed, his elbows resting against slightly tented knees, “About what?”

“That you’ve been moonlighting as a Chippendale Ben?” Luke bites out sarcastically, “I know you’re not this stupid. Does Leia know about any of it, about Rey? About getting fired? About…”

“About what?” 

Yes about _what_ Luke, Rey would really like to know as well.

“No, I was fired yesterday. Apparently, my performance was slipping,” it’s not entirely a shock to hear but it makes her chest ache all the same, “And I didn’t want to tell mom until I— Until Rey and I figured this out. You know how she’ll be. Excited for grandkids and all that and its— that wouldn’t be fair to Rey.”

“Hate to break it to you but none of this is fair to Rey.”

How weird to sit and listen to her personage being discussed as though she's not in the room at all. An omega’s fate really, to sit in the back and listen. To exist and only speak when spoken too. Better get used to it now, her life of sexual servitude. Maybe Ben will have a nice room for her. Somewhere she can nest and he’ll only bother her when she’s in heat. The thought hits like a rock dropped into a puddle, the ripples scattering tiny ripples of thoughts in every direction. Maybe she won’t want that, only her heats to be shared. Maybe she’ll want more, maybe she'll want him. To know him, to understand him, to share in his joys and his heartache, to know that someone else in the world understands her. Because he does, or he would at least if she let him. 

No, she couldn't be a house omega with no worth more than the treasure between her legs. Even now she finds she craves so much more than that. She wants to hear him ask about her day and listen as she talks about trivial matters. Wants to feel that flutter of curiosity, the prodding of his emotions and the way they rain down on her like a waterfall. Happy to see her, relief when he finally gets to touch her. 

His hands against her skin, holding her, pressing her down. His mouth, delicious as sin with kisses that land like the wings of a butterfly before they burn like the sun. Teeth that nip and mark and claim and oh how it feels to be claimed by him. Fingers, arms, thighs, and a cock, that glorious cock that’s built to split her open. 

A soft whimper escapes her, knees pressed together and both men stop in their conversation, “Rey, Sunflower,” he’s talking to her like she’s some caged animal, Luke’s tone soft and knowing, “You ok sweetheart?”

Ben growls, moving to his feet, putting himself between her and Luke quickly. Territorial, he’s protecting what’s his. She’s _his._ Always. Forever. He said he might love her, that he _could_ love her. She could be loved. She could belong to someone, they could start a family… the nausea stirs again, stress she’s concluded with some desperate appeal shooing off the males in the room with a pointed glare and a growl of her own. But her mating gland itches, prickly and agitated beneath her heavy wool s carf. With careful consideration, Rey pulls the warm blanket like shall from around her neck folding it neatly over her arm to lie it down on the desk. 

The reaction over such a simple act is… shocking. Both sets of eyes grow wide, Bens are almost black as he takes a step and then stops looking very much the part of a wounded animal. He stands in a state of limbo, pulsing in all directions. A hand outstretched, his fingers twitching he looks at her as though asking permission though for what she can’t be entirely sure. Or maybe she can. The whisper of _please_ a barely-there fluttering at the back of her mind. A need to touch her, to feel her beneath his hands to know that she is real. To show the alpha raging in his chest that it can calm and stop tearing down the walls within. Fraying the edges of his barely held together sanity. 

A soft nod, bearly there, hardly perceptible as more than a chin tuck and he’s at her side. He’s there so close that it makes her head spin, like every space available around her is reserved solely for him to exist in. He belongs to her, the guardian of her hopes and dreams, his need to protect her strong and vibrant like a sunrise.”Yo-you smell,” he stops and looks at Luke who nods before turning his attention back into her, “your scent has changed,” is all he manages to say, swallowing hard as his fingers jitter and dance across her cheek. They sweep in an arc into her hair pushing it back and exposing her neck. Without reason or conscious capability, she leans into his touch, his palm as warm as his smile. 

“Of course, yours has too,” she reasons but Ben shakes his head, his fingers dipping to tug at the neck of her sweater.

“May I?” He whispers, nodding to the small patch of skin that he’s exposed. Her mating gland, the place where his teeth have left her marked and claimed forever his. Again, she nods, steeling herself against the sudden intrusion into her space. His presence large and over baring and yet pleasantly welcome all the same. He doesn’t take her over, doesn’t swallow her whole and bury her beneath his own incredibly potent alpha-ness. Instead, he hovers back, lingering over the mark, his mark, taking an appraising sniff that lasts for longer than is strictly necessary. He inhales her like he’s sampling something precious, something rare. A fine wine to be savoured, the taste so decadent and rich that it makes him a little dizzy. She can feel it. The appreciation, the rolling purr that vibrates through his throat erupting into the air around her. It almost feels indecent, such a primal appreciation making her belly quiver and her cunt clench around nothing at all. The memory of how he filled her invading her senses, “No, it’s- it's something- it’s different from the last time. Last time you smelled like me. This time it’s-” Another long appraising sniff, his nose twitching as though the answer is sitting just there on the tip of his tongue. 

“Rey-” There’s that coaxing tone again, the one used on timid children when they’re afraid to say hello to strangers. The one Luke adopts when he’s trying to convince her something isn’t a good idea. Or… maybe that something _is_ , “Sweetheart, I think you need to see a doctor.”

“I have my annual coming up in a few days,” she wants to tell him to stop fussing but it feels kind of nice having these two men fawning over her well being, “You don’t need to be worried though, I throw up when I’m stressed, it happens.” 

Luke, however, does not look convinced leaning back against the door awkwardly trying to cross his arms, “Works better when one isn’t fake,” he mumbles to himself and Ben snorts looking away, “Shut up, don’t be disrespectful.” 

“Right…” the back of a wrist meets her forehead as Ben grumbles something about her being warm, stepping back to give her more space or maybe to give himself space it’s kind of hard to tell. Something is overwhelming him. Something strange, her scent but something beyond that too. It’s unsettling him, making him nervous, making him want to pace but there’s no room to do so and he’s getting agitated. 

It makes her chest feel tight as the urge to vomit rising up in her throat again. Watching him has become a painful thing but feeling it. The way he plummets through emotion like he’s falling through time and space with no anchor to sanity, “Luke, I’m going to go home if that’s ok with you.”

Her employer is so busy staring down his nephew he almost misses the question, “Hmm? What? Right, yes. I was going to suggest that. I’m sorry having Ben here is strange for me. Do you need a drive home?”

“I can take her.” 

Luke looks like Ben just offered to fuck her right there on the desk. Not something that Rey can say she would necessarily object to at this point, “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“She’s my mate-”

Instead of standing there listening to them argue Rey scrambles to her feet grabbing her scarf as she makes a b line for the door. Luke isn’t a tall man but he’s solid and persistent when he has the mind to be, so she finds herself staring him down with the petulance of an agitated child, “Luke, please move,” she huffs, tossing her scarf around her neck and the fluffing her hair out carefully, “I’m too tired for this, please I’d really like to go home.”

“Are you far from here?” She wants to snap that it's none of his business but the look of concern pulls the words off her tongue. Ben's need is a palpable thing but not sexual she’s surprised to find leaving her unsure whether or not she’s relieved or disappointed. He just genuinely wants to make sure she’s ok. His heart rate flutters, pale skin pinkish up around the collar and the tips of his ears as he struggles with finding the right words, “I… let me take you halfway at least or… maybe let’s go to the pharmacy down on the corner so we can get you some Gatorade.”

“And maybe a pregnancy test,” Luke mutters making Rey's entire world explode into a radiant well of colours and sensations. 

Ben looks sheepish, apparently, it had been on his mind too, “Your scent _has_ changed,” he offers weakly making her snap.

“Yeah, because you. Bit. Me!” A finger pointed at Ben’s chest, she stabs at the muscular squish underneath. At least that hasn't been affected by Ben letting himself go a little, “of course my scent has changed what did you think was going to happen?”

But Ben drops to his knees reaching out to pull at her hips until his forehead is pressed against the flat underside of her belly. The small space where a baby would grow if she _were_ in fact pregnant. Buts she’s not. She can’t be, she’d had a period… shit

Is it possible to taste panic? Coppery and thick like sucking on a penny it wells in her mouth, no not panic, that's blood. She’s bit managed to chew on her lip until it’s gone raw, working her canine against her sensitive gums. Ben swallows, licking his lips, can he taste it too? “Shhh shhh,” he tries to soothe, his hands moving up and down over her hips, “It’s ok, it’s ok.” 

All she can think of is his promise, the one he’d made in the alleyway under the influence of hormones and need. He’d promised her a baby, a family and now he’s on his knees in front of her worshipping at the altar of her fertile womb and she _feels_ it. The flicker of something warm and real. Not the roaring fire of desire or the all-encompassing flames that threatened to burn her before but something real. Something to be nurtured, something she finds precious, hope. It feels a little like hope. That strange little thing that use to keep her warm late at night in the foster homes where the alpha boys would scratch at the door asking her when she was going to go into heat. When they would call through the walls as they jerked off offering her their knot to sit on. The flicker of something wild and sweet that doesn’t frighten her now but fills her with a yearning she’s never quite known. 

It’s not the fairy tale love story that she’s always dreamed about but then again she’s never really been the secret princess type. They were never the characters that she found herself drawn to, fair maidens who needed others to do things, who's lives were built around their relationship with a man. No, not them, never them Rey was always drawn to the spunky sidekick or the girl who snuck off in the middle of the night with the hero’s sword to fight. The Joan of Arcs, the fierce Gwenovere and the Eowyn’s that rode into battle and stood tall and proud. Her happily ever after might not involve a pumpkin carriage or a fairy godmother but it was something she could design herself. But she’d never really know the shape of it unless she gave it a chance to grow. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Feel free to come say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	6. I’m hard to love and I just want someone to try

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I want my freedom,” she hears tumble from her lips, “No alpha commands, no telling me I’m not allowed to do something. I’m a person.”
> 
> Ben pulls away quickly his eyes narrowing before hurt and fear dance across his pale face. He looks- wounded, as though her words could cut him so deeply, “I would— Rey do you honestly think I’m so horrible a creature?”
> 
> “I don’t know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My brain is mush for Nano so I'm updating this.  
> Guys, I just want to say too, if there's anything not tagged in this that you feel should be please, please, please let me know. Either drop a comment or DM me on twitter.
> 
> CW at the end lovelies

Several hours later and a trip to the pharmacy later Rey finds herself in a room that seems both incredibly foreign and yet far too familiar. The walls are painted a deep dove grey offset by the large windows that sit on either side of the bed. It’s spartan in nature with distressed hardwood floors and industrial shelving that looks like it's been built out of iron pipes and live edged wood. Definitely not something found at Ikea. 

The bed itself is soft and plush and perfectly made down to the crisp line of the folded down sheets. The meticulous work of someone who takes pride in their neatness. It’s the most lavish thing in the room, other than a rather interesting looking wooden box that sits on a dark wood dresser next to a lamp. Curiosity begs her to go over and open it but the idea of being so familiar in the space so soon makes her feel uneasy.

Her belly gurgles, reminding her that Ben had tried getting her to eat some plain toast not long ago in hopes that she could manage to keep such a bland snack down. SO far so good but now she’s alone with the brown pharmacy bag sitting on the bed next to her screaming at her to pick it up. 

Ben comes and goes with the fervour of a man who had no idea what to do with a woman in his apartment. Acting as though the place is an utter disaster he adjusts a few books on the coffee table and picks up a mug that had been left out washing it quickly before settling it into the drying rack for safekeeping. He would hate her place she decides in about two seconds. While his is all sleek lines and everything has a place hers is an explosion of chaos and color. Things that she’s collected over the years, pieces of her life that she could never give up. 

Fear mounts her shoulders pushing her down, slumping her against the bed in a huff. They’re mates and they know nothing about one another. He doesn’t know that she’s a slob, he’s going to hate it. He’s going to hate her. 

A soft hand finds itself hovering over the flat plains of her belly, the place where apparently little pieces of her and him have joined together to make something of itself. A ball of cells, nothing more than the promise of something, the beginnings of a human but as real to her now as anything ever has been. The pregnancy test seems more like a formality, a way to convince her that yes, this is happening because Ben seems to know. He knows the same way he knows that the sky is blue and Toronto Maple Leafs will never win the Stanley cup. It’s just there, a certainty, a truth because he made her a promise and he was true to his word. 

Still, it seems a little too surreal to be her life, like she’s fallen asleep while reading a good book and tumbled into its pages like Alice through the looking glass. Her mating gland tickles as the feeling of warm pride swells within her belly, something kind, something real that doesn’t quite belong to her. The feeling of being complete, of calm and contentment. Like he’s proud to have her lying there amongst his things, surrounded in a world that he intends to make theirs. 

The bed smells good too, that smokey cedarwood and that lingers in her nose and strokes along her spine, smooth and calming. Quietly Rey turns onto her side and buries her nose into the pillow inhaling sharply so that his scent consumes her conscious mind. It makes her dizzy, light-headed and a little aroused, pressing her knees together as she basks in the richness of him. It isn’t long before she’s fallen asleep, or maybe lost in a daydream, pulled back to the waking world by the sound of the bathroom door being opened. Steam billows out in heady plumes that smell like him, of body wash and musk and something so distinctly alpha that she’s fairly certain he may have been masturbating in the shower. 

Her nose twitches as he enters the room, a fluffy black towel slung low on his waist. He’s cleaned himself up, shaved off his stubble and taken care of the mess around his nose. A man who knows how to take care of himself, an alpha who knows about proper skincare and by the looks of it has a regimented hair care routine that would put Rey’s to shame. His chest is just how she remembers it in her dreams, pale and toned. Speckled with moles and a few small scars she has half a mind to ask him about but her eyes keep darting back to the tattoo that decorates the entirety of the upper half of his left arm. A snarling lions face that looks half mechanical. Not mechanical she realizes but the inner workings of a clock. Cogs and wheels blended in with its jaw as half the face of the clock swirls through its wild mane and down into a bed of artfully drawn roses. It’s beautifully drawn in a brilliant greyscale but the eyes are a vibrant blue. 

Ben catches her watching as he mills about his room, opening the wooden box to put away his watch. Inside she sees a number of circular faces, a collection she realizes, her eyes roaming over the pale skin of his back down over his arm again lingering on the lion. 

“I wasn’t always a mild-mannered accountant,” he offers her with a shy smile, wet hair falling in his face as he settles the silver banded watch back into its velvet casing next to its friends. 

It occurs to her that she never really knew what exactly it was that Ben did, accounting it seems, “I—“ maybe she should have asked but she was too busy either trying to fuck him or run away. No time for asking important questions like, what do you do for work? How do you like your eggs? Do you want a family? Are you sane?

“I guess I _was_ an accountant, I’m unemployed now,” As though it’s only just occurred to him Ben throws her a pained and apologetic sort of smile, “I promise I won’t be unemployed for long. I have money in savings too we— I mean— I can support us.” 

“I’m not quitting my job.” She needs to hear herself say it, to know that those words are words she’s sticking to, words she swears she will never, ever deviate from. 

Ben simply stares for a moment as though she’s said something he can’t quite understand. Maybe he thinks it’s an unrealistic demand, keeping her job, it might not be much, but it’s hers and she plans on holding onto everything of hers that she can, “I would never ask you to.”Turning to lean agains the dresser Ben hitches one ankle over the other. Resting back against his palms he keeps pressed against the surface of the dresser, “Luke clearly cares about you and while he may drive _me_ crazy I would never ask you to isolate yourself like that.” Shaking his head he smiles and then chuckles, “My mother would kill me if she thought I was that kind of alpha.”

“Ok—“ Petulantly she pushes, sitting up on his bed and scooting forward so her feet hang off the end. The bed is so high that her feet don’t touch the ground making her feel a little like a child, “And if I don’t want to live here—?”

Ben simply shrugs, “I’ll move in with you if you want or we can find a place. In the city or outside it doesn’t matter. We could rent or maybe buy a house if that’s something you want. I’m flexible.” He seems to pick up on the underlying meaning, the what if that comes with ‘ _I don’t want to live with you_ ’ attached. “I should say I’m pretty flexible but Rey… there are _some_ things you have to be flexible on too. We’ll talk things out but I’m— I’m going to want things and you’re going to have to be willing to hear me out.” 

Here it comes, the list of sexual demands, the debauchery, the maid outfits and the sex toys. The meeting him at the door dressed in no more than an apron, the having meals cooked and the house cleaned. Her anxiety peaks making Ben push off the dresser. He hovers a moment as though trying to decide the best course of action. After a breath he closes the space between them dropping to his knees before her to rest his palms atop her thighs, “First and foremost little one,” he coos and then reaches up to caress her cheek, “I want you to be honest with me with whatever you’re feeling. It’s hard, this pull, I catch glimpses of it, I can— I can feel bits but it’s a little like playing a game of telephone. I don’t want to misinterpret or misunderstand. Can we start there?” 

Rey nods and Ben smiles resting his cheek against her knees as he begins to purr. A soft rumble that vibrates through his chest and into her shins as he allows himself just a moment of peace. “The living together isn’t something I’m willing to budge on. Not if you’re pregnant.” 

It’s not just her but the baby he’s worried about as well she realizes, idly pushing her fingers through waterlogged locks.

“We don’t need to share a bed or even share a room if that would make you more comfortable.” He hates the idea but he offers it anyway, his distaste filling her mouth like ash, “I mean, we can alternate homes, a few nights at yours, a few at mine but it seems foolish to waste money in the long run.” 

“I want my freedom,” she hears tumble from her lips, “No alpha commands, no telling me I’m not allowed to do something. I’m a person.”

Ben pulls away quickly his eyes narrowing before hurt and fear dance across his pale face. He looks- wounded, as though her words could cut him so deeply, “I would— Rey do you honestly think I’m so horrible a creature?” 

“I don’t know,” she offers softly, falling back as Ben bolts to his feet. He stands over her tall and proud and yet half a man. There’s something missing, a piece that he had before but now seems to have lost. A part, she wonders, that might just be found lodged within her own chest. If he cracked her open would he find it there or simply crawl inside and make himself a home. Would he carve out a place for himself, locked away safely where she could never pull him free? Would she ever truly want to?

“What are you afraid of Rey?” When she doesn’t answer he presses, “Do you fear me little one? Or is it how I make you _feel_ that terrifies you?”

His words pour like steeped tea into her empty cup. Warm and sweet and comforting they swirl like dark promises she simply cannot escape. It makes her belly warm, the space between her thighs aching for him the way it has since the first time she took him there. 

He smiles, dark and feral as he picks up her scent on the air between them. It falls like permission granted pulling him closer until his hands are pinned against the bed on either side of Rey’s shoulders and he’s there, right there, with his nose pressed into the hollow of her neck. “You feel it don’t you, this pull, like we’re being dragged towards one another. I felt it that night at the bar. When I saw you standing there in that pretty little dress and those delicious heels.”

Her breath falls in soft puffs as Ben’s knee pushes her thighs apart wedging himself between them. The towel at his hips seems to loosen a little, held in place only by the way he’s pressing himself up against her, “Do you feel it sweetling? The way your body calls to mine?” 

There’s so much she feels that it’s hard to pinpoint exactly the feeling he’s talking about. She feels tugged in all directions and warm, almost too warm as his lips skate across her neck in a barely-there kiss. The touch of his nose against the underside of her jaw makes her skin erupt in gooseflesh as he licks a trail up the column of muscles along her throat until his tongue is swirling around an earlobe tugging it gently into his mouth. The sounds are wet and utterly filthy but sweet all the same as he pulls back with a smile. “Tell me I’m not crazy, tell me you feel it?”

All Rey can do is nod, her eyes wide as Ben presses down against her. His cock is a hard-line pressed against her core as he gently starts to push and press. His erection has become an obvious thing, one calling to her quietly promising to fill and take and fill some more, “Not gonna fuck you,” he says softly pulling back so that he can finally breathe again. His towel is an afterthought falling to the floor so that his body now stands on full display. She’s seen men nude before, seen Ben nude as a matter of face but she’s never really paid attention to the things that attracted her to the male form before. Ben’s fit but soft too, his belly the kind that offers a little bit of squish on top of muscles that can be flexed into existance. He’s practically hairless too which makes her wonder if he has some strange sort of hair removal regime. Most men she’s been with in the past have some smattering of body hair but not Ben.

There are a few stray hairs around his nipples, nothing to write home about but his chest beyond that point is completely devoid of anything even remotely resembling hair. Smooth abs lead down towards a belly button that makes her want to poke at it and beneath that a small trail that leads down to a thatch that sits atop a proud erect phallus. She giggles to herself as the word phallus flutters through her horny hindbrain forcing her back into the bizarre reality of the situation.

“See something you like?” Ben asks, his cock bouncing under her attention. He likes that she stares she realizes happily, sliding to the floor so that she’s sitting on her knees, her face now level with his heavily hanging member. 

Licking her lips she watches as Ben sucks in a breath, his eyes growing large as she wriggles a little closer. From this angle, she’s sure she paints the perfect picture of omega servitude. One her knees waiting for her alpha master to slip his erection whenever he sees fit, fucking her until he’s covered every last inch of her in his cum only to turn her over and fuck her some more. 

It’s what she’d deserve, after all, born as a lesser being. A creature designed to take and take and take some more. Why then does she feel so powerful?

“You need to—“ Ben starts as Rey slides her hands over powerfully toned thighs. They’re as pale as the rest of him with a smattering of dark hair coating their surface. Nothing long, nothing obscene, just enough to remind her that this is a man. A man with a cock that’s demanding her attention.

Shifting up on her knees she edges a little closer bringing her mouth just a heartbeat away from the swollen crown purple and angry and drooling precum all over itself. “Rey you should go take the test,” he tries but she’s not ready to listen, staring up at him with large doe eyes, her tongue darting out to lap at the cock head dangling in front of her. It bobs against her tongue, the salty taste of him exploding over her tastebuds as she wraps her lips around him carefully and sucks his cock slowly into her mouth. It isn’t much, less than an inch really but she allows that inch to fuck her mouth, bobbing up and down, the wet sounds of her mouth filling the quiet spaces between them.

Ben stifles a grown, his hands flexing at his side as he tries to figure out what exactly to do with them. One reaches out and cups her cheek then falls when she takes more of him deep in her mouth stealing away the air from his lungs. 

One hand snakes up cradling his balls gently while the other wraps itself around the warm hard heat of his shaft. Her fingers barely touch, giving him a careful squeeze as she drools a little using her hand to pick up the saliva and work it in tandem with her mouth. 

Torquing her wrist she swallows him down, playing her tongue along his underside until it hooks gently against the flared head and then dips carefully against its dribbling slit. 

“Rey,” she hears him say again, a plea but for what she’s not entirely sure. He could mean for her to stop, or to simply keep going, pushing and pushing until her throat relaxes and he's groaning like an animal. Without warning large fingers slip through her hair tightening their hold on her scalp. “Fuck Rey,” He groans working his hips in short, sharp movements until suddenly he just sort of stops. “Sweetheart— fuck.” He holds her head and dips his cock in like dipping his toe into a bathtub to test out the water, “I’m going to end up fucking your face if you don’t stop.” 

Rey groans and nods, her head bobbing just a little on the end of his dick. When she pulls away he allows it, almost seeming relieved as she bends forward to place a kiss against the tip. “I need—“ She starts, kissing it again, this time with a little tongue, swirling it around the swollen crown as he gazes down at her in blissed-out awe, “I need you to, please Ben?”

Pressing his cock towards his belly Rey runs her tongue up along the underside following one of the pretty blue veins that decorate his shaft, “You—“

“Want you to fuck me face.” She says around him her tongue darting out to lap around the flesh of his knot gently. She watches his chest heat, his lips press together as he tries to figure out what exactly it is he’s supposed to do in a situation like this. Like the desire to be a good man is warring against his desire to fill her throat with his cum. 

He groans softly as she takes him in her mouth again, working her way up and down in agonizingly slow motions until she feels the bounce at the back of her throat. it’s not all the way down, not to where she wants it but she knows with a little hard work and elbow grease she’ll have him bottomed out in no time. Pulling back she moans against him, her fingers squeezing lightly at Bens knot.

His hands find her hair again and she hums her approval urging him to pull just a little. It’s hard to convey her wishes with his cock working down the back of her throat but when she swallows he groans again, his fingers tightening in that sweet, sharp pleasure sort of pain that makes her belly sing. 

Stopping her hand from jerking him off into her mouth he mutters a soft, “Hold onto my hips,” and she nods because he’s there, right there on the edge giving in. She slows down a little, taking him in deep again, her lips grazing the edge of his knot. That gets his attention her mouth his for as long as she allows it. It’s power, and pleasure and more importantly her _choice_ , relaxing her throat and angling her head so that he slips back a little more. 

“Fuck you’re so pretty like this,” she knows she has him when he starts to babble, “mouth stretched out over my cock, pretty lips taking me in so well.” It’s his thing she realizes, mild-mannered accountant by day and filthy-mouthed porn god by… well it’s still daytime so apparently this is just him. His hips are moving now, almost of their own accord, dipping in and out of her mouth, as she opens wide and lets him go. He pushes gently at first, guiding her mouth down and over him as he works himself into her. 

Rey can’t help but watch, drunk off the power as she moans around him, saliva dribbling over his shaft and down over her face as he picks up the pace. She groans in approval, brows waggling as he pushes himself deeper working her back and forth while picking up the pace, thrusting as he pulls at her hair. She feels herself choke and he’s there pulling back, a look of alarm painting his sweet features. 

It’s easy enough to shake it off, opening her mouth wide to accept more of him in after he’s given her enough time to catch her breath. She likes the feeling of being messy, the way his cock bounces off the back of her throat stealing her breath away just a little. 

“Perfect fucking mouth, perfect tits, perfect little cunt. So warm and wet. I bet you’re wet right now, taking me down the back of your throat like this. Are you wet little one?”

She moans and nods, the edge of his knot catching on her lip. It’s getting bigger the more that he rocks in and out, in and out, pulling her down viciously against him, “I bet that pretty little cunt is so pink and wet just waiting for my cock.” He fucks into her mouth, the words spilling from his lips in a hopeless barrage of need, “But you can’t have it, I’m going to come down your throat and you, my sweet girl are going to swallow it happily aren’t you?”  


Rey nods widening her eyes, begging for it, all of it. “Such a good little girl aren’t you, focusing on my cock, built to take your alpha’s cum.” Strong fingers pull harshly on her hair opening her throat as he pushes and she gags and she fucking loves it. She loves the way it feels to have him pushing her to her limit, her eyes watering as he trusts harder, babbling on about how pretty she is, his good little omega, begging her to gag on his cock, “Love the sounds you make sweetheart. You want my cum?” 

Widening her eyes she squeezes her fingertips into his hips pulling, tugging him, urging him to keep going until he’s there on the edge. “Tell me you want it, tell me you want my cum, all of it.” All she can do is moan, but the sound is muffled by the fierce snap of her hips. His cock pulses against her tongue, his knot a solid thing against her lips, so swollen he can no longer push in past it. Her jaw aches in a way that she finds that she craves, unsure how much more she can handle but totally sure she isn’t willing to stop until he’s done. 

His hips stuttering, he groans, loud, like a holler, “fuck— fuck—“ he’s squeezing her hair to the point he might actually be breaking strands off at the root but it doesn't matter, nothing matters but the sudden rush that spills into her mouth, the way he comes and comes, thick and salty coating the back of her throat and filling her mouth until there’s nowhere left for it to go but out passed his shaft like a dam that’s been broken. It burns at the back, stings a little as she breathes in through her nose and he’s crying out, sobbing as he holds over top of her, hips bucking until there’s nothing left and her face is a sticky mess of cum and saliva.

When Ben finally pulls out, after his cock has stopped pulsing and there’s nothing left but a flaccid penis and balls that have been emptied Rey’s jaw pops and cracks settling into a healthy and happy position. For a moment, maybe two Ben just stands there, staring down at her as though he’s never actually seen her before in all his life. As though she just happened to materialize there on the floor of his apartment and beg him to fuck her face. 

“You—“ he starts, panting, his shoulders and chest dotted with perspiration as though he’d just run a marathon and maybe he has in some respect. 

“Me—“ She offers, licking at the cum that dribbles down her cheek and at the corner of her mouth, “You too.” She adds and Ben laughs, dropping to her knees before planting a kiss firmly upon her lips. He seems to have little care for the fact that she still has _him_ plastered all over her face, her tongue, her mouth. He kisses her as though he’ll never get a chance to again, holding her face like he did when he was fucking her mouth but more tender and careful than anything she's prepared for. 

He kisses her mouth, then her nose, peppering her cheeks and forehead until she’s laughing and they’re collapsing on the floor in a heap together.

Sometime later after Ben has drawn her a bath and picked out a pair of jogging pants and a button-down shirt Rey pees on the stick. It’s an odd sort of feeling trying to urinate on the little piece of litmus and not all over her hands in the process. She places the little thing on the window cill wrapped up in a piece of tissue and climbs into the large tub settling into the heat blissfully. 

After a moment or two Ben knocks on the door. He’s dressed now, a casual pair of jeans and a t-shirt that in some cultures might be considered far too tight to be decent. It holds snuggly to his chest and his biceps putting most of his tattoo on display. He has a few others she’s discovered in her casual appreciation of his body. There’s a cross with a date tattooed on the inside of his wrist, something that’s easily hidden beneath the strap of his watch. Now it sits on display as he takes a seat on the lid of the toilet settling into a casual and strange sort of conversation. There’s a mountain range on his upper thigh with what looks like stars falling from the sky around it. She didn't quite get a good look despite being up so intimately close to it before. She had other things on her mind after all, like his cock jammed down the back of her throat. 

Even now her jaw aches but she relishes the feeling. The power of being used as _she_ sees fit still fluttering through her veins as she sinks into the warm soapy water. “You feeling ok?” Ben asks softly, his bare feet shifting on the floor as he reaches out with a fluffy facecloth in hand. His intention is clear even without the bond between them and she leans forward to give him better access. He scrubs at her back, softly pushing aside wet tipped hair to clean up around her ears and down over her arms.

When his hand disappears into the water to scrub at her back she doesn’t startle but relaxes into his touch. He wants this, needs it in some way or maybe it’s her that needs it. It’s getting hard to tell where her feelings stop and his begin, the line blurring between them now that they’re so dangerously close together. She’s not entirely sure that she likes this, the feeling of being swept up in someone else but Ben takes to it like a fish to water. 

“I’m sorry if I— if I was—“ he stumbles through the embarrassment of it, strangely humble for a man of such filthy words. His silver tongue just a thing for show perhaps or maybe something that spills out of him only when he’s ‘ _in the mood_ ’. “Was I too rough?”

Rey peers back over her shoulder, “When you were fucking my throat?” And, is that? is Ben _blushing?_

“Yes, when I was doing that,” he mumbles softly sliding down onto his knees so that he’s closer now as though the arm's length of space between them was simply too much. “I don’t want you to think I don’t respect you.

Her sudden laugh startles him, the water jostling as his hand stutters at her thigh. He’s pushing the cloth over her legs with no real purpose or aim, simply content to touch her when she casts him a sardonic sort of glare, “How can you respect me?” she asks quietly, “I barely respect myself at this point. I go back to your hotel room—“ a pause, “I’ll need you to explain that one to me by the way, because you clearly have a home. I fuck you, a complete stranger and then I run away.”

“I understand why you might have felt that was your only choice.”

“Either way, I then fuck you in that dirty alleyway that smelled like kitty littler and piss— I— I asked you—“ her voice drops lower, knees drawn up to her chest, her arms wrapped around them, “I asked you to choke me and then this? I don’t even know who I am. Not a person I respect that’s for sure.”

Ben takes a moment to consider, his clothe gone now in favour of his fingers roaming up the back of her leg until his chest is pressed against the ledge of the tub and his fingers are probing at the space between her legs, “I don't know,” he muses softly, resting against a forearm that’s leaning against the porcelain ledge, “You knew what you wanted and you went for it. I don’t think that is something to be ashamed of.” 

Wiggling her toes in the water Rey finds herself spreading her legs a little wider allowing him the access he seems to be requesting. Only he doesn’t push further than the gentle stroking around and through her labia. The gentle caress a soft reminder that he’s there edging around her clit the way she often does when she’s at home alone. Like he knows her, how she likes it, like he’s spent years studying the different ways to make her moan and come for him. But he does know, doesn’t he?  


He knows things about her that she’s never spoken aloud, pieces of her soul that she's tucked away from prying eyes. He knows little things that were once private but now belong to him as well. Two parts of a greater whole, a dyad, two that are one, a perfect mated pair.

“You think?” did she say that out loud? She’s certain she hadn’t but then how did he know? Pride flares between them, a barely-there whisper that tells her he knows he’s done something good, something she likes. Picking up the pressure, teasing and sweet as she lays back against the back of the tub and he smiles, “That’s it sweetheart let me take care of you.” 

One wet hand emerges from the water clutching at his arm as he continues to toy with her clit. It’s lazy, easy even, soft rubbing that feels like nothing and everything all at the same time. When her hips start to move she knows that she’s close. It doesn’t feel like much but her legs ache, slipping out agains the bottom of the tub, “You’re close aren’t you sweetling,” 

Rey bites at her lip and nods, her fingers squeezing his arm as he starts to pick up the rhythm. Nothing extravagant, nothing intense but a flutter of pleasure that peaks and crashes until his finger slips in and she’s there. It happens bright and perfect, a gasp on her lips as she closes her eyes, “That’s it beautiful, let it go,” Ben coaxes softly, one finger becoming two as he slowly works into her, his thumb still edging along her clit in soft slow circles. “Good girl, my sweet darling girl.” 

There’s a whimper and Ben sucks in a breath and there, right there it happens in soft pulses, tiny eruptions that ignite like little bombs being detonated along her spine. Her body twitches, her hips bucking as she rides out the wave of it, Ben’s fingers slowing until she’s empty again and missing him already, “Let me love you Rey.” she nods, drunk off his touch, terrified as he starts to pull himself back. She grabs for him quickly, the water sloshing around in the tub tugging him closer and closer until he’s toppling inside. He falls carelessly, trying to avoid squishing her but his body is a solid mass pressing her down. She clings to him now, arms and legs wrapped around him like a koala as he struggles to hold himself up just a little. 

He sputters and squawks as she nuzzles into his neck, her mouth playing softly along his mating gland. It seems only fair after all, he’s bitten her, broken her skin, claimed her as his own why shouldn’t she do the same?

The nip is tentative at first, the gentle press of teeth as Ben laughs a soft, “What are you doing little omega?” 

Her lips work softly, delicately, teeth scraping as she builds up the nerve to actually do it. Ben’s body tenses, his knuckles white as he holds onto the side of the tub, his voice laced with apprehension as he tries once more, “Rey?”

It happens fast, like ripping off a bandaid. The decision made the moment she managed to pull him into the tub with her. He’s there and he wants to love her and his blood tastes coppery and sweet as it spills into her mouth. Ben gasps, his body going tense as she loosens her hold and laves at the spot with her tongue. His hips move, feet pushing against the bottom of the tub, a laugh ripping from his throat that sounds drunk and euphoric. 

He’s stroking her arm as she blesses him with soft kisses, her saliva already working to heal the mark left by her teeth. She wonders if he’s mad, he doesn’t feel it but there’s this fluttering sensation that’s taken over her thought process. This glow of giddy warmth that makes her belly feel full and heavy and safe. At first, she thinks it’s her, the idea that she has taken something else, drawn a line in the sand, made her intentions known loud and clear. It quickly becomes apparent however that the feeling is stemming from Ben. Ben who purrs softly, his chest a quiet rattle as he hums his contentment and kisses the back of her forearm. Ben who feels safe, who feels cared for and… there’s a thick feeling there too. Something she doesn’t quite know how to quantify. It’s there like a heartbeat, a thrum through his veins that settles in his chest like a firefly fluttering its wings. Is it— could it be love? the beginnings of something strong and real weaving through his blissed-out mind. It’s affection, strangely formed to look like something she might recognize in anyone else. 

Something she knows at a distance because it’s obvious what it might be. How could anyone miss that? the warmth and adoration that coalesces with something primal. Ben’s soft “thank you,” a barely-there whisper. “I’d be very ok if you did that again sometime.” 

Rey nods pressing her nose into his shoulder not trusting herself to speak. Words burn like wildfire scorching the back of her throat as Ben peers back trying to catch a glimpse of her. He pulls away, the water spilling out onto the floor as he adjusts their positions. His wet clothes rubbing harshly against her back as he winds his arms around her and snuggles her close.

It’s still warm in the tub but the crisp autumn air is cool in the bathroom making Rey shudder, trying to force more of her body beneath the rising bathwater. Ben makes it difficult to hide but the breadth of his arms makes her feel safe “Have you looked at it yet?” he inquires after some time, his fingertips traipsing across the backs of her forearms. 

“No,” she doesn’t want to tell him she’s frighted of the answer so she’s been waiting for him. Confirmation either way a dauntingly terrifying prospect. Is she ready for this? The yes or no, there's no turning back. 

“Together?” 

Rey nods again, wishing more than anything she would turn onto her side and burry herself away beneath his flesh like an ostrich. Crawl into his skin and live there, tucked away safely where no one could hurt her, “Hey— It’s ok. If you are, then great and if you’re not we can always try again later on down the road.” Later, an offer of more time but they both know that if that little test displays one line and not two there’s going to be an emotional fall out that neither of them is quite prepared to deal with. 

“I’m really sorry.” she offers but he squeezes her softly and presses a careful kiss on her cheek.

“I’m sorry too,” they don’t say for what because truthfully it doesn’t matter. There’s a litany of things for both parties to be apologizing for but Ben doesn’t dwell on that. He simply reaches out towards the window cill and picks up the test.

Never so nervous in all over her life Rey takes the small stick from Ben’s hand and turns it over so that it’s hanging over their heads. One breath. Two breathes. Ben’s body stills and Rey suddenly is opening eyes she hadn't realized she had even closed. 

“Well sweetheart,” Ben chuckles, “I guess you and me and a baby make three.” 

Because there they are, those two little blue lines, the promise of a love that will last a lifetime. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updated tags for deepthroating and CW for pregnancy. It’s tagged but it actually is announced in this chapter
> 
> Thanks for reading! Feel free to come say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	7. And we'll take it slow and grow as we go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ok, well, this is all very unexpected.”
> 
> “Which part? the Pregnancy? the alpha? the mated bit?”
> 
> “All of it really, I have to ask, I mean legally I’m required when a situation this… sudden and forgive me Rey but this does seem sudden— crops up.” It’s uncomfortable, he doesn’t want to ask, the question there, the one that makes her skin crawl, the flicker of curiosity that humans get when faced with an A and O pairing, “Are you ok?” at least he’s diplomatic about it, the underlying ‘were you forced into this?’ a heavy implication as warm blue eyes force her to meet him halfway on this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a heads up, Pregnancy is tagged but there is a fair amount of it in this chapter.   
> Also, just want to say thanks, your love has been super overwhelming. I appreciate it, I appreciate you. You're all incredible

She tries to tell Ben he doesn’t need to come with her to her doctor's appointment that week. He doesn’t need to walk her to work, or sit, drink coffee and read magazines while he waits for her to be done either. But he does. All of it. His presence in her life a sudden and strange thing that leaves her feeling crowded and hostile. Still, she doesn’t turn him away when he dresses in the morning and follows her to the door. Nor does she argue when he takes her hand in his as they walk up Callingwood or as they settle into their chairs in her doctor's office.

It’s a little strange to go from constantly blending in, to standing out like a sore thumb but Ben is a large man and an alpha and he fawns over her like they’re high school sweethearts. Like he’s known her forever. The strange thing about it is, the more time they spend together the more she wishes that were true.

She starts to wonder if maybe they’d met under different circumstances she might have loved him still. Not that this thing she feels is love, no, it can’t be. But, maybe if he wandered in off the street to buy a book, or perhaps if Luke had introduced the two of them at one of their evening cooking dates she might have felt some pull, something real. Like that thing Ben talks about whenever he brings up the night they met. The bar, what she was wearing, her heels. He particularly loves those heels and although they’re slightly out of season she still finds a way to work them into her wardrobe. Not for him, she reasons but because they make her feel powerful. Then again Ben's attention always seems to make her feel powerful

In no time at all, they find themselves in a rhythm, a healthy sort of existence that some might consider domestic. He doesn’t push the living situation and they don’t have sex again which honestly feels a little strange. Like they’re trying to figure out how to be with one another without the urgent pull of need and biology. They don’t even share a bed which means they stay at Ben’s place more often than not. His two-bedroom boasting a spare bed which Ben sleeps in giving her the California king that is far too large for her and makes her feel like she’s swimming in a marshmallow. Her apartment, on the other hand, is a one bedroom flat with very little space and a rather small couch that Ben has to curl up to sleep on. Still, he does so with the air of a man just happy to be invited. 

Things get left places, a sweater, a toothbrush, and soon her favourite body wash is sitting in his shower caddie and his favourite brand of cereal is sitting in her cupboards. He even goes out and buys a brand new coffee maker so that Rey can have her one cup a day, no more than that though because caffeine, Ben has read, is not good for the baby.

It’s weird having a Ben. Not an alpha because she can’t actually wrap her head around the reality _there._ The bite mark, or the kaleidoscope of feelings that tumbles through her mind and heart far too large and intense for one being to process. It’s one of the things she struggles with the most while Ben takes to it like a fish to water. He watches carefully picking up on the subtle changes in her mood, anticipating her needs before she even understands them herself. He claims it’s just being a good alpha but the truth of it is there etched across his heart. It’s being a good _mate_ and she hasn’t quite mastered the art of that yet. She’s barely able to accept it, their bond. Introducing him to people as just Ben and running away whenever anyone inquires as to how they know one another.

“You know you can just tell people you work for my Uncle right?” He laughs as they sit eating ice cream in the park. His treat, of course, it’s always his treat. He’d calmed he was craving something sweet but Rey is fairly certain it had more to do with the monumentally shit day that she just so happen to be having. Like he picked up on her panic and filtered through all the things until he found something he thought might make her smile. And of course, it worked, how could it not with his secret trap door into her mind. 

She hates even more that it makes sense, the idea that they might know each other beyond a casual fuck and a monumental fuck up. They could just be two people who met casually the way two people do. Maybe he told her a funny joke about Dan Brown or they connected over their mutual love of kittens. It doesn’t matter really because to the outside world their story is as normal as any other.

To the outside world, yes, but not to her doctor. She hadn’t quite thought about how this was supposed to go down. Ben folded into a chair that looks to be made for children compared to his hulking frame while Doctor Kin eyes him warily.

There’s the average questions, inquiry into her cycles, has she been sexually active. Ben sniggers at that earning him a back-handed cuff as Rey grumbles for him to behave. Doctor Kin is solemn and quiet his thick brow raised as he watches the interaction between Rey and her alpha. Because that’s how this looks. An omega and her mate. There are questions there beneath the surface, the quirk of his lip, the subtle way that his eyes glance over to Ben. At first, it’s obnoxious like her Doctor feels he needs to refer to the alpha in the room for confirmation but then, then it becomes something else altogether. His jaw is clenched, his eyes narrowed, he’s… the Doctor is wary or Ben and Ben is either too use to it to care or too oblivious to notice. 

“Hey, Ben, can you go get me something to drink?” A hand on Ben’s knee makes him startle and for just the briefest moment she thinks he might argue but he nods and stands, stretching so that his shirt rises up exposing the pale underside of his belly and the soft trail of hair that escapes down beneath his pants. It’s hard not to follow, not to want to touch, to run her tongue along the lines of his hips but he cups her cheek and kisses her nose before heading out into the hallway with his hands shoved in his pockets. 

Doctor Kin relaxes considerably, rubbing his thumb and forefinger over the bridge of his nose, “Ok, well, this is all very unexpected.”

“Which part? the Pregnancy? the alpha? the mated bit?”

“All of it really, I have to ask, I mean legally I’m required when a situation this… sudden and forgive me Rey but this does seem sudden— crops up.” It’s uncomfortable, he doesn’t want to ask, the question there, the one that makes her skin crawl, the flicker of curiosity that humans get when faced with an A and O pairing, “Are you ok?” at least he’s diplomatic about it, the underlying ‘ _were you forced into this?_ ’ a heavy implication as warm blue eyes force her to meet him halfway on this. 

With a sigh, Rey forces a smile, the kind that says she's tired, not trapped or so she hopes, “It’s inconvenient, sure but yes, I’m ok. Ben is—“ for a moment she stops to ponder just what exactly Ben is, he’s a lot but he’s sweet too. He’s supportive if not overwhelming, kind, loyal to a fault and she’s only really known him a short amount of time at this point, “He’s a good person. The sex was— is consensual. All of it. If I told him to stop he would.” Of that, she is one hundred percent certain. 

“And the bite?” Does she have to answer? maybe if she avoids the question long enough, “Rey,” the Doctor presses, “Rey if the bite wasn’t consensual then you are able to press charges.” the idea hits her like a cold wet cloth splattered against her face. It’s strange not because someone would suggest it but because the idea of reporting Ben makes her gut ache. Like someone is twisting her up inside trying to pull him away from her because reporting him would separate them and the idea of being apart from Ben like that is suddenly the worst thing she’s ever thought of. 

Her hands are shaking, no it’s her whole body that’s trembling, gooseflesh breaking out over the backs of her arms. Where is Ben? Why did she ask him to leave again?

Doctor Kin shifts, uncomfortable, uncertain, he’s pulling up a chair and sitting in front of her. His body language is open, kind. He’s totally out of his element here but he’s trying, cautiously skating around the larger issue at hand, is this a biological response or an emotional one or the more dangerous of all, both?

“Rey, you understand why I have to ask these things right?” Rey nods, but understanding does not mean she has to like it, “My concern, my only concern is whether or not you are safe.”

A soft bitter laugh rolls from her throat, “Doctor, the one thing I can assure you I am, is safe.” But still, her hands won’t stop shaking. There’s a tug around her middle, a soothing warmth that erupts across her skin like a hot flash and Ben is through the door in an instant. He looks like he’s just run a marathon, his pale skin flushed pink, dark hair windswept and pushed back off his forehead. In his hand, he holds a water bottle but it seems more of an afterthought as his chest heaves and he— has he been running? 

It takes everything in her not to bolt to her feet, struggling against the need to feel his arms wrapped around her. 

Ben, however, has no such reservations, be blustered passed the doctor and drops to his knees scooping up her face in his palms. His dark eyes are sweet like honey swirled through dark tea as they take careful stock of her mental state making sure for himself that she is, in fact, alright, whole, safe. 

The trembling stops in an instant, his touch like a bandaid, “Sweetheart?” 

Rey nods resting her cheek into his touch as he presses his forehead gently against hers, “M’ok,” she tries for a smile but lands on more of a relieved sort of grimace as Ben turns his focus on the doctor he’s just displaced.

“What did you do?” the accusation is sharp.

“Ben stop it—“ her fingers tug his attention back, pulling their faces together so her nose bumps against his own, “Ben, shh,” nuzzling the tip of her nose against his she brings him in for a chaste sort of kiss. One that Ben accepts with a sigh of relief before pulling again and standing at her side. His hand rubs soft circles between her shoulder blades his position clear, he’s not leaving again. 

“I apologize Mr—“

“Solo, Ben Solo.” 

The last name sticks like a fly caught in a spider's web sending tiny tremors of reflection through her mind. The name, had she not known his last name until now? It seems a thing one should know if they’re mated to someone and yet she can’t quite recall ever hearing him say it out loud. Not once. Has he?

“I apologize Mr. Solo. I—“ 

“Look, I’m sure this seems sudden,” Doctor Kin makes a soft noise, a confirmation of sorts, “I’ll leave if everyone present,” if Rey he means but he’s being diplomatic about it, “feels it would be better for me to wait in the hallway.” It’s not a threat but it hangs in the air over her head like a bomb waiting to go off.

“Rey?”

Right, yes, that’s her name “I want him to stay.” A flutter of appreciation settles like a warm cloth against her neck as she looks up at Ben, “Please, I want him here.” It’s more of a need than a want but she doesn’t have to say it Ben’s pupils dilate and he nods. He understands, as simple as that. He is hers to command. 

“Very good then. So, you gave me the date of your last period. By my calculation, you should be around the seven-week mark but we won’t know for sure until we do an ultrasound for dating. I’m going to get you to go for a series of blood work. Try and go Monday, Wednesday and Friday if you can. I just want to make sure your hormone levels are rising the way we want them to. After that, I’ll schedule you the ultrasound but for now how about we do the pelvic exam and just make sure everything is ok there?”

She can feel more than hear the way Ben growls. He’s struggling with the idea that this man, this strange man whom Ben doesn’t know is about to take a look at her vagina. It’s irrational and very alpha and thankfully Doctor Kin seems blissfully unaware, standing quickly to start pulling down a series of instruments from the shelves above as he prattles on about prenatal vitamins and things to watch out for. 

“Have you two registered yet?” It’s the one question she’s been dreading. The one thing that she and Ben have managed to argue about for the past five days. 

“No,” comes Ben’s answer, a bitter thing that tastes like sour cherries dipped in vinegar. 

Trying his best to seem neutral Doctor Kin pulls a johnny shirt out of a drawer setting it down on the freshly rolled-out paper the covers his exam table, “Rey, you really should make that a priority,” here we go.

“Can you please explain to her what her suppressants could do to the baby?”

“Your partner is right to be concerned Ms. Niima,” Ms. Niima, not Rey. He’s only ever called her Ms. Niima twice before and once was when he first introduced himself, “Suppressants are designed to suppress your hormone and pheromone levels. Mated alpha’s and omega’s don’t need them suppressed because the bond between mates helps to control spikes and surges. With pregnancy, your body increases its production of estrogen and your suppressants will try and stop that from happening which leads to— well Rey. You need to come off the suppressants.”

The silence that follows is deafening, thick and heavy, weighted down with a panic that makes her skin start to crawl. Ben’s uttered, “Please,” is a barely-there thing that follows the soft tremble in his hand, he’s terrified. Invested already in a small ball of cells no larger than… what did he tell her this morning after going over the math in his head. 

A blueberry. 

His fear claws up the back of her throat making her tongue feel thick with nothing left to do but nod. She’ll give him this, “Ok.” and then a little firmer with her forehead pressed into the soft fabric at Ben’s belly, “Ok, I’ll stop.” 

“I’ll write you a note for now which will work in the short term but you’ll need to get registered as soon as possible in order to avoid any long-term legal issues.” Ben’s relief is palpable, his hand resting on the back of her head while his fingers inch down her neck. He does this sometimes without realizing he’s doing it, searching out the area where the imprint of his teeth mar her flesh, As though he's drawn to the area by some mystical force, a reminder of what she means to him. 

At first, she’d thought it possessive but now she can feel it for the reminder that it is. She’s real and she hasn’t run away from him again. “Good,” Doctor Kin says with a nod, “Now I’ll get you to get changed into the johnny shirt and pop up on the exam table for me. I’ll leave the room and give you a minute. Mr. Solo—“  


“Ben.”  


“Right, Ben. You’re ok with him in the room for this next part?” 

Rey doesn’t bother to look up she simply nods and waits for the sound of the door clicking shut. Once alone the air seems clearer, she can breathe comfortably now that it’s just she and Ben. It’s strange the way his presence has this effect on her. Like he makes the world better by simply existing.

The next bit is all business. Rey pulling off her scarf and handing it to Ben, then her shirt while he folds her clothing carefully and she toes off her boots. Her skirt is gone and then her nylons leaving her in her bra and underwear set shivering in the cold.

Ben’s hands meet her upper arms rubbing gentle against the goose-pimpled flesh, “Sweet girl, come one,” he coos softly, kissing her forehead as she slips out of the rest pulling on the johnny shirt and popping up onto the exam table.

All in all the appointment goes well. There’s no sign of anything abnormal but the Doctor warns that the increase in growth hormones may change that so he encourages her to make another appointment in another few weeks just to be certain. He gives them a handful of samples of prenatal vitamins and quietly writes out a note excusing her temporarily from the use of her suppressants.

He’s halfway through explaining the next steps in the whole baby process when Ben’s phone goes off. His ears pink up as he fumbles to pull the tiny device from his pocket mumbling a hasty apology as he starts to hit ignore and then stops. The phone’s ring is one of those preprogrammed tones which Rey really wouldn’t have paid much attention to but Ben’s muttered, “Fuck,” pulls at her focus. The cellphone seems so tiny and insignificant in his hand but that’s not what catches her eye. It’s the name on the screen that he tries desperately to hide, “I have to take this, I’m so sorry.”And he’s gone through the door grumbling out something harsh that Rey can’t quite catch as the door swings shut. 

Doctor Kin waits a minute, his hands shoved into the pockets of his lab coat before he smiles, “If anything comes up or you have any questions please give the office a call ok? I have time set aside in my day for pregnancy patients so we can easily slip you in?”

Rey nods, swinging her feet off the edge of the table, “Thanks, Doctor.”

“A pleasure as always—“ 

“I’m ok,” she blurts out quickly, not entirely sure why but the need to clean the air bubbles up in Ben’s absence, “I know that you’re worried. I know— I am ok though. Processing it all but Ben is— he’s a good man. A better man than most really.” She can feel him in the hallway. His anxiety has spiked and it feels like he’s pacing, “Our situation might be a little unorthodox but,” With a sharp intake of breath she lets her focus fall on the door and the space left in the room from the alpha, _her_ alpha’s hasty exit, “Ben is— he’s a good mate and he’ll be a good father.” 

“Rey it’s not my place to judge,” then why does it sound like a judgement is coming. It always happens with the human sort, trying to understand the biology behind alpha and omega’s baser instincts. Maybe it’s jealousy or a fear of something they don’t understand but human beings judge, people in general judge it’s a human flaw that is so inherently universal. Like some dirty secret that people try and hideaway. A shame they have but can’t get rid of. It’s not the judgement that necessarily causes the problem but what comes after, “Really Rey, it’s not. I’ll be the first to admit my understanding of Alpha and omega biology is purely scientific. You’re one of a handful of omega patients I have and as you can probably guess I don’t have any alpha patients. You’re also the first to come in mated. I’m sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable.” 

“Thank you, Doctor.”

“You call if you need anything ok? Get your blood work done and we’ll get that ultrasound scheduled and Rey, no more suppressants.”

“No more,” she agrees watching as Doctor Kin makes his exit with a smile wishing her a happy holiday. Once alone the room feels cold again, void of the space heater of an alpha for comfort and warmth. 

It takes no time at all to slip back into her clothes, fluffing her hair out when Ben stumbles back into the room looking frustrated and a little perplexed. His hair is a mess, well, more of a mess than usual, as though he’s been running his hand through it over and over. The cellular device in his hand, one of average proportion she might add, sits like a beacon, the question barely there on her tongue before Ben starts talking, “So, we just got invited to my parents for the Thanksgiving.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yes, this was a bit filler-y but I wanted to show a bit more about how alpha and omega pairs are viewed in this AU and set up for the big finish muahaha  
> Lemme know what you think my lovelies!  
> Come say hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	8. I'm still learning to love, just starting to crawl

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You are stunning, Han, isn’t she stunning?”
> 
> From his place behind the counter, Han grunts his approval caught mid munch with a second spoon full of stuffing halfway to his mouth, “For god sakes Han, wait until dinner!”
> 
> “What? I’m hungry now!” comes his defensive answer quickly popping the spoon in as he scoots away from his wife’s causal swatting.
> 
> “Honestly, dinner will be ready shortly, we’re just waiting on Luke,” turning her attention back on Rey, Ben’s mother adds with a cheeky grin, “I married a heathen.”
> 
> “And she loves me all the same.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a little rushed but I wanted to have it out on Thanksgiving, my weird little brain told me that's the way it needed to be
> 
> CW's at the end darlings.
> 
> Happy Thanksgiving to all my American loves xo

They’re less than forty minutes into a two and a half-hour drive when the reality of their situation really starts to set in. At first, it had seemed like a good idea, a weekend tucked away with Ben and his family. A family which he seems to think that she will soon one day be a part of should she want it. Though Ben personally seems to have some serious misgivings about these people he calls loved ones, he swears they will simply adore her.

His mother is a force of nature and his father will talk her ear off. There may or may not be someone named Chewie there and with any luck, Luke will be present so Rey won’t be completely alone in this den of wolves. He paints a pretty picture in coppery undertones, a backsplash of blood set against the burning of autumn leaves. Dangerous beauty, best observed from afar, whatever that means. She finds it’s easier to simply trust him, it’s more comfortable that way but Ben’s apprehension is a hard line between them. His nervousness like the buzz of bees crawling along her skin. 

Maybe they shouldn’t have come after all. Maybe they should have spent a quiet long weekend eating take out turkey sandwiches and store-bought pie while playing a modified version of two truths and a lie and never have I ever. That’s what Ben had suggested, why hadn’t she picked that option instead? 

Now she finds herself sitting in the comfortable leather seats of Ben’s pointlessly fancy car as the picturesque countryside unfolds before her very eyes. Crisp fall leaves brilliantly woven together like an autumn patchwork quilt covering the world in a blanket of color. A mottled array of vibrant reds, oranges and yellows laid out against the landscape over rolling hills as far as the eye can see. Rey has never been this far north before, the small towns popping up like something out of a fairy tale. Villages that are full of tall proud churches that sit along the coastline with their decorative log houses, antique stores and homemade goods sold on the side of the road. 

Never in all her life has she ever seen so much natural beauty, the raw colours of the world around them standing out against the stark black of the road travelled. In the distance, the ocean and its salty crisp scent sparkling in the sunlight like a tapestry stitched from starlight and diamonds. 

They don’t talk much which admittedly is a little strange as it’s all they seem to have done these last seven days. Learning little pieces about one another, like how Ben likes his eggs and could eat breakfast for any meal should it be allowed. Or How he loves to run but only in the morning and hates country music with a passion. In turn, she gives small pieces of herself away, nothing telling, nothing dire, but her affinity for Elton John and how she’s always wanted a dog. Not a small one but something large and slobbery that would take up too much space in the bed,

Ben, of course, promises they’ll get a dog, two, maybe even three if she wants it. After the baby is born, after they've settled into a more permanent home. He’ll take her to a shelter or they’ll find a breeder if she wants. He’s so willing to give her everything and it’s a little overwhelming because there’s so little she wants to actually offer him in return. 

She quickly learns though that he’s quite funny, that sarcastic dry sort of witty that often goes over people's heads. He’s careful though, thoughtful too, sharp and bright and patient. So very patient and not just with her but people in general which seems to contradict his very nature. 

But he doesn’t talk on their drive and so she doesn’t push it. Instead, she relaxes into the soft leather of his seats, lulled into a warm and sweet sort of comfort. The seats are heated she realizes happily as her eyes growing heavy and sleep sings softly into her ear. She’s been so damned tired lately. Tired and nauseous but apparently that’s how this whole thing starts. Morning sickness, tender breasts, exhaustion that seems better-fitting someone who’s been training for the Olympics. Her body just doesn’t want to. 

So, she takes the moment, slipping off into dreamland barely aware of the way Ben’s hand manoeuvres on the gear shift by her knee or the way his lips quirk in a soft smile as he casts careful glances in her direction. She can feel it though, the way his heart lightens, or the confidence he has rolling through the motions. It covers up the unrest, the subtle tightness that settles in his chest whenever his thoughts veer off in another direction. 

It’s hard to tell whether it’s the shift in direction met with the gentle rumble of tires pulling onto gravel or the way Ben’s thoughts pitch that causes her to stir but it’s there. Consciousness met with an insurmountable need to not open her eyes. Ben reduces their speed and then reaches out to take her hand, his palms warm, balmy as a nervous zing runs through her jaw and down her throat. Ben is apprehensive and he’s using her as a tether to tie him to a certain level of patience that flutters in her chest like the wings of a butterfly. Fragile, delicate, a barely-there hum and a beat that wavers in an instant.

His lips grace the back of her knuckles and then the touch is gone, her hand sat on his thigh as he grabs the gear shift and adjusts accordingly. His soft, “Rey,” pulls her eyes open, like his speech commands her attention making her wonder if he feels the same. If she were to speak while he was dozing would her words rouse him in a similar fashion or is this an omega’s response to their alpha? something biology dictates of her, “I need you to do me a favour ok?”

Her only response is a soft, “Mmmhm,” as she turns in his direction, her head resting against the back of the seat, watching his profile shift in the dappled sunlight. The trees are thick here but the sun is bright and persistent.

Ben’s smile however is a cautious thing, “If you’re uncomfortable at any point in time I need you to tell me and we’ll leave.” It seems strange at first, such an obvious request, of course, they would leave if they were made to feel uncomfortable, why wouldn’t they but also, why would they be made to feel uncomfortable by Ben’s family? 

She doesn’t even realize she’s laughed until Ben has pulled the car into park in front of a two-story wonder that couldn’t possibly be a home. It looks like a luxurious country hideaway. A small hotel for the rich and famous to slip away to whenever they need a break, There’s so much to look at that Rey finds she needs to do a double-take. Tall, and obscenely white with columns and windows everywhere and attached to the architectural wonder is a four-car garage with what looks to be an apartment or perhaps an office over top. A space, perhaps, where a young teenage Ben could escape from his parents thought it’s hard to imagine needing separate space in a house as grand as this.

“Rey,” more urgent, the leather squeaks as Ben shifts in his seat, “I’m serious. You don’t know these people like I do.”

“They’re your family, Ben.”

Saying his name out loud has a strange sort of effect. He looks shocked but happy, his scent pleased, a rumble emanating from his chest, “Yes…” long, drawn-out, struggling against— Rey’s cheeks warm as a trickle of something overtly sexual seeps though this strange bond of theirs.

“Ben!”

“Fuck, I can’t help it,” He’s palming himself through the font of his jeans, his cock a hard line pressing against the hard denim “You say my name and it’s an instant turn on,” he grumbles, pawing at himself like a teenager now, pulling her focus off the handsome contours of his face and down to the waiting erection hidden from view, “Do you see what you do to me?”

Without warning Ben’s steals her hand, pressing her palm against his growing predicament, “And now,” he bites out softly leaning in just so, “All I want to do is fuck you in my car in my parent's driveway like a fucking teenager,” A groan, a whimper, “And they’re going to know the minute we walk through that door.”

Reaching out Rey takes his cheek in her palm turning his attention back upon her, “And if I called you alpha?”

Ben’s reaction can only be described as a violent shudder, his eyes closed, lashes fluttering as he works his lower lip between his teeth, “Rey—“ a warning, or maybe a promise as his large hand engulfs hers holding it against his cheek a moment until he’s able to regain some form of composure. A kiss on her palm tells her she’s safe but his barely-there composure is frayed around the edges and like a kitten playing with a new toy Rey can’t help but bat at them restlessly. 

“There’s lots of space around here to get lost in.”

“Rey—“ Firmer this time as she leans forward, her nose bumps against the strong angle of his, her lips brushing softly against his mouth. It takes him a moment, like he’s playing catch up with the sensation but when he finally leans into it. It’s not with the burning passion she’d been expecting, instead, his kisses are soft, slow things that pepper her mouth sweetly before his tongue rolls out tasting the bottom of her lip, “Sweetheart, stop toying. I’m serious. My mother can be— a lot. You won’t know what's happening until you’re suffocating and she’ll make you feel like you should thank her for it. Please.”

“I’ll tell you, promise.” Pressing her forehead into his she holds the moment. Something new, something amazing passing through them in this instant. It’s there, as quick and real as a heartbeat, the steady flutter of something brilliant and sweet that warms her chest like a hug. They hold the moment, seconds passing maybe minutes it’s hard to tell, cocooned in their peace when a soft rap of knuckles against the car window pulls them away from one another. Ben grumbles while Rey gasps, a hand at her throat as she peers out into the daylight beyond to see the gruff yet friendly face of a man staring back at her.

“You kids just going to sit out here canoodling and leave us old people waiting? I’m not getting any younger you know.” He grumbles the way Ben does, that half-hearted sort that speaks more of an annoyance than general displeasure as he takes a step back and shoves a hand securely into his pockets, the other holding a slow-burning cigarette.  


Ben mutters a soft, “Sorry about him,” Raising a brow before throwing his door open and slipping into the brisk autumn air. With the door shut with a soft click, Rey is left feeling moderately stunned, the soft hum of conversation muffled by the car’s study design. 

One. Two. Three, like ripping off a band-aid Rey throws herself into the world of the unknown.

The man, Han, is Ben’s father. He wasn’t actually looking for them but snuck out to finish a smoke and happened upon Ben and Rey sharing a moment. His wife, Ben’s mom, Leia doesn’t like the habit so it seems Han sneaks, pretending that Leia isn’t onto him while Leia pretends her husband isn’t a dirty smoker. 

“Filthy habit, don’t recommend it,” Han quips with a deep cough, a fist thudding against his chest as his lungs protest the cool fall air mingled with residual smoke as he butts his cigarette out against a stone bench perched between two large shrubs, “Benny never started it thank god, you smoke?”

Rey offers a shake of her head as Ben mumbles something that might have been, “ _She can’t_ ,” but it’s hard to tell. 

His father raises a curious brow and then shrugs throwing a hand over his shoulder calling Rey to follow him in with a pointed, “Let Ben grab the bags, you two are planning on staying right?”

“Yes Dad, that’s the plan,” sarcasm, annoyance, it’s family at its finest. 

Han however seems utterly unfazed by Ben’s childish hostility adjusting his pants in that fatherly way before throwing an arm around Rey’s shoulder. His body is warm, warmer than she expected could he be. A soft sniff confirms it. There, beneath the light dusting of cigarette smoke and old spice is the faint musk of an alpha. It’s subdued, likely by the fact that he’s mated but it’s there all the same. Ben’s parents are both alpha’s. She’s so busy pondering out that mystery she barely notices the zing of displeasure that shoots like a hot strip down her spine. Ben doesn’t like that his father is so close to her, his father either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.

“So, you’re Luke’s girl huh? He’s told us a bit about you, but how did you end up meeting Benny here?” A warm hand rests against her shoulder as they stroll towards the front doorway of the home. 

Inside smells like heaven. Baked goods, pumpkin something and turkey. Oh god, the turkey. Rey’s mouth starts to water and then her stomach flops. It’s a strange contradiction met with a curious glance from Han as he pulls away and toes off his loafers. “Princess, they’re here!” he calls out happily slipping into a pair of well-worn slippers as motions for Rey to do the same. Next to a wrack which might be for coats or may just a decoration Rey can’t tell, is a wicker basket full of thick woollen slippers or various sizes and colors. 

Picking a pair that looks to be about her size she slips them on and ties them tight waiting for Ben to join her. “Them and their damn slippers,” he gripes, toeing off his blundtstones and arranging them neatly next to Rey’s converse, “Will you grab me the grey ones please?” Ben asks with a nod as he starts digging through his bag until he produced a pair of wine bottles that Rey hadn’t seen him pack. Not that she was watching him closely, not really. 

Once they’re both happily slippered, their bags tucked away next to a hallway that Rey can only assume leads to a series of bedrooms, Ben leads her towards the kitchen. His hand on her back is a warm and welcomed weight, “I brought red, sorry mother, I know how you feel about your white.”

“Not just white,” Ben’s father chimes in gleefully, “Cheap white, you know your mother loves a good box wine,” they’re teasing but Rey honestly can’t remember the last time she had an issue with a lovely boxed white. She’s never spent more than fifteen dollars on a bottle of wine in her life but the bottles Ben is setting on the counter look like they could pay for her last cellphone bill. 

“Oh shut up, the both of you,” comes the voice of an older woman. Rey almost doesn’t see her at first, huddled over the kitchen table in front of a laptop. 

“Really mom, working?” 

“I got an email from Ackbar just before you two showed up and you know how worked up Gail can get about things—“  


Without thinking Rey blurts out, “Gail Ackbar, Senator Ackbar?” 

All eyes in the room turn on her in an instant. Had she done something wrong? The older woman, Ben’s mother Rey assumes just sort of gapes at her. Dark eyes scrutinizing carefully as she moves to stand up, her hands placed carefully upon her hips. 

“You must be Rey!” there’s a flourish of wrists and suddenly the woman’s arms are opening up, the bangles on her wrist chiming brightly as they click together welcoming Rey into a fierce and warm hug, “It’s so nice to meet you. My brother speaks very fondly of you. You’ve made his life at that book store of his so much easier.”

Is it possible to sound both proud and condescending all at the same time? If so, Ben’s mother has mastered the art. Her eyes crinkling at the side as she pulls Rey back to take a better look at her, “You are stunning, Han, isn’t she stunning?” 

From his place behind the counter, Han grunts his approval caught mid munch with a second spoon full of stuffing halfway to his mouth, “For god sakes Han, wait until dinner!”

“What? I’m hungry now!” comes his defensive answer quickly popping the spoon in as he scoots away from his wife’s causal swatting.

“Honestly, dinner will be ready shortly, we’re just waiting on Luke,” turning her attention back on Rey, Ben’s mother adds with a cheeky grin, “I married a heathen.”

“And she loves me all the same.”

“Someone’s got to,” come’s Ben’s deep gripe as he sidles up next to Rey and plants a soft kiss on her temple with a possessive hand on her hip. 

The conversation seems to flow easy enough, general questions asked, where are you from? what did you do before coming to work at the bookstore? Rey skirts over the particulars not wanting to give too much away too soon. There are still things that Ben doesn’t know about, pieces of her history that she doesn’t feel the need to delve into over a family dinner with people she’s only just met. 

Han and Leia are lovely though, the kind of couple you see in those made for tv movies. The ones where people live their happy ever after and the only real grievances are ones revolving around miscommunication and a comedy of errors. They joke and pick at one another and Ben when the opportunity arises but Ben doesn’t bite, instead he lets them do their thing, keeping himself constantly positioned within Rey’s close proximity.

“You never told us how you met!” Leia chimes after her second glass of wine. Luke is late, not by much but enough that Rey’s stomach has started to protest the lack of food within her immediate vicinity. She wonders if it would be rude to pick a little, nibble on a carrot or maybe some crackers. Her belly feels strange both when she eats and when she doesn't but hunger has taken on a while new monstrous meaning thanks to the small ball of cells that is being nurtured by her body. 

Ben huffs muttering something about a bar and a work function, leaving Rey to nod like she knows what he’s talking about. He had told her he was there on work and from what little Ben has said about the topic his employer, First Order had sent him to check in on their office in the area and decided it would be in everyone's best interest if he stayed to oversee things for a bit. There isn’t much Rey knows about Ben’s job for the First Order. She knows he’s an accountant, or at least that’s what it sounds like his job title is— _was_. He managed people's money but whenever she asks questions Ben always gets evasive, changing the subject without warning or distancing her in other, more _creative_ ways. 

Bringing up work this time however seems to have a similar effect on Leia, one minute she’s asking about how they met, the next she’s going on about how happy she is that Ben is away from that vulture Snoke. 

Vulture, Goblin, whatever creature this man resembles, one thing is for certain, Ben’s family despises him. Ben too seems less than fond. Though he keeps his lips sealed tight on the matter, Rey can feel the flicker of something that almost tastes like fear whenever the name gets brought up.

Grabbing his hand she gives it a light squeeze prompting Ben to bring their linked fingers to his mouth planting a kiss on her wrist. His lips linger, a smile drawn sweetly in thanks as somewhere in the distance a door swishes shut. 

“Sorry, I’m late!” 

Rey holds back to urge to cry out _‘finally’_ but her relief must be palpable because Ben is laughing pushing back his chair with a grin, “Thank god, I’m starving!”

Dinner is a veritable feast. There’s both turkey and honey glazed ham, parsnip, turnip, two types of potatoes, carrots, sweet potatoes, onions cooked in melted cheese, stuffing and for dessert three different types of pie. 

“You didn’t cook did you, Leia?” Luke asks as they settle in eyeing his heaping plate of veg and meat as though it might jump off the plate and attack him. A gentle poke with his fork at a generous piece of white meat prompts, “It looks and smells far too edible to have come from your hands.” 

“Oh shut up Luke and before we eat I want to go around the table and have everyone say one thing they’re thankful for.” 

Ben’s groan is stifled with Rey’s elbow, “I think Ben would like to go first.” 

The joke, as it turns out, is on her because Ben seems to take the challenge with gusto grinning into his wine as he takes a careful sip. Rey can’t help but eye the wine glass jealously, Ben’s eyes glittering with mischievous intent as he makes a show of savouring every last drop. He’s teasing her, the bastard is teasing her and damnit if she doesn’t find it slightly endearing. “Ok, if you want. I’m grateful that you said yes when I offered to buy you that drink.” 

Leia’s ' _awe_ ' is met with a joint ‘ _blech_ ’ from both Han and Luke who share in their displeasure like a couple of children, “Rey, your turn.” Leia hums.

It takes a minute, a lot of things have transpired in the last few months, a lot of large, life-changing things. Some of which she’s still trying to work out her feelings on. Is there any _one_ thing she’s grateful for? One amongst all the small working parts? “I suppose,” she starts, adjusting herself with ankles crossed primly placed beneath her chair, “I’m grateful that I’ve been given the opportunity to start my life over again. To live simpler,” Luke laughs, “to appreciate things more.”

“Ouuu there’s a story there!”

“Mother—“ Ben warns.

From there it’s Luke who is grateful for his wool socks, “And ok, maybe Rey for making my life easier.”

Han is grateful for retirement and good scotch and Leia is grateful to have her son back home for the first time in years. There’s talk about sports, then cars, then work, well Luke and Rey’s work mostly. It’s relaxing, comfortable even. Leia asks a lot of questions but whenever she gets a little too close to something that Rey finds verges on too personal Ben is there ushering her away from the topic quickly. As though even without knowing the trauma that litters her past Ben knows that Rey needs the space. 

Eventually, they all retire to the living room, or one of the living rooms anyway. The informal living room. The house boasts three after all leaving Rey to wonder why any sane pair would want a home with three living rooms in the first place. 

Han pours himself a scotch offering Ben a glass which he declines politely taking a place on the blue love seat that sits beneath a large picture window. The sky is a beautiful array of reds and golds, the world shifting from bright and glorious to glittering magic as the sun takes its last glorious breathes of the day. Leia and Han tell the story of how they first met, alternating between plot points as one or the other gets something wrong. No, it was nighttime, yes he had been driving the Falcon at the time, how could Leia ever forget that. There’s a side comment about how Ben was conceived in that car which prompts Ben to take his leave for a much-needed bathroom break leaving Rey at the mercy of both his parents and his uncle. Eventually Luke seems to be of a similar mindset, skipping off to the kitchen in search of a glass of water. 

Suddenly they're talking about the foster system and the sad state of help for kids in need and Rey finds herself getting incredibly uncomfortable. Leia is an alpha but she talks about omega’s rights like she’s been there in the trenches herself. It’s oddly discomforting, hearing your own issues being spoken out loud by the very sort whom seem to revel in keeping their thumb on the oppressed. 

Back and forth Han and Leia banter, tossing about ideas for change. Two alpha’s discussing reproductive exclusivity and the ethical right for young omegas to suffocate their biology in suppressants. Leia agrees but wonders about the health issues that might follow while Han argues that omegas in group homes aren’t worried about those kinds of things. The bigger issues are whether or not they’re safe from alpha kids and whether their home is equipped to deal with things like their heats. He talks like he knows what it's like in those homes. The ones where the alpha boys scratch on the doors late at night pestering the omega girls on the brink of their heat. Where the ones who run the homes are human with no sweet clue what it's like to be an alpha or an omega to keep the kids safe. It's an imperfect system and the conversation is a little too close to home, needling beneath her skin in a way that makes it feel a little like she’s being flayed. 

Suddenly there’s a high-pitched noise erupting from her throat and she’s bolting to her feet without a seconds hesitation bringing the attention of both alpha’s in the room directly upon her, “Uh— bathroom?”

Leia’s eyes are wide and dark and curious but Han sees to understand nodding towards the hallway at Rey’s back, “Last door on the left.” the last thing Rey hears as she slips out the door and into the bright air is “You’re making the poor thing uncomfortable Leia, back down.” 

After taking maybe a little too long in the bathroom, splashing water on her face and promptly throwing up her turkey dinner Rey finds herself back in a world she doesn’t know. Whitewashed walls full of art that hangs on the walls like something out of a magazine. There are no family photos, nothing personal in anyway, just paintings that look like they belong in a museum. 

With a careful eye, Rey follows the hallway back, observing but also feeling. The world around her is strange and cold without Ben by her side as he has been since they arrived. His scent something that pulls her consciousness in the direction not of the living room but of the kitchen where Luke disappeared off to. Maybe Ben got sidetracked, hungry or tired and needed a drink himself. He’s been so good not to have any more than one glass of wine in case they need to make a quick exit but there’s something else there too. A need to remain in control at all costs. He’s afraid of what he might say if his tongue were loosened. 

Agitation pricks beneath her collar, her mouth dry, her tongue itchy, the need to scream there like a weight. _Ben,_ Ben is agitated. His words like ash in her mouth stir up messily painting the back of her throat like chalk.

“She’s going to find out, what are you waiting for?” That’s Luke, his words hushed, as something beyond the mouth of the kitchen doorway bangs. It’s hard enough to make Rey jump but not loud enough apparently to draw the attention of Ben’s parents. 

“I don’t want to freak Rey out any more than she already is. Telling Leia about the pregnancy is only going to throw her into overdrive and things are just starting to get good between Rey and me.”

“Good—“ Luke scoffs, clearly not convinced by Ben’s heartfelt plea. 

“Yeah, as in she’s getting more comfortable with me and I don’t want to fuck that up. She’s my mate Luke, you have to know what that’s like. You of all people know how intense it is—“

Luke’s voice erupts like a lightning storm, deep and dark like Rey has never heard it before, “Don’t you ever bring that up again, you hear me?” he barks and Ben falls silent. 

There’s a soft puff of air, someone, Ben has exhaled sharply, “Rey,” she shouldn’t be surprised really, of course, he knows she’s there. 

“Rey come in here,” Luke calls but it’s Ben’s presence that beckons her. His turmoil, his fear pulling around her middle like a bungee cord snapped tight.

Rounding the corner she finds Luke and Ben leaning against the kitchen island facing off like two rabid dogs. Luke looks wild, his shoulders hunched like he’s ready for a fight. Ben on the other hand looks tired, like he’s been fighting an uphill battle and is just about ready to give it all up. “How much did you hear?”

“It doesn’t matter,” she tries but somehow that doesn’t feel like the case at all, “Really you don’t have to explain, it’s ok”

But it isn’t. Something, whatever it is is very much not ok. There’s an air in the room that runs thick like busted exhaust. Ben did this, he opened this can of worms and he’s scrambling, desperate to shove it all back together. It’s strange because Luke is hurting and while she loves him and rationally she knows she should go to his side, to be there for him, there’s still this pull to Ben. Biology and rational thought do not make good bedfellows.

With a groan Rey sinks into a nearby kitchen chair, her face swallowed up by her hands as she groans out her confusion, “Rey,” Luke, his voice soft and understanding, “I know Sunflower, I know.” but what does he know? The pain that’s tearing her gut in two? 

“Go to him, it’s ok,” Luke urges but Rey can’t bring herself to move. It feels like a betrayal of the first person who has never truly looked out for her before. The first person to see her as more than a designation, as more than just a woman. “It hurts, I know it does, your bond won’t let you stay away, the more you fight it the more you’ll only hurt yourself.” 

There’s a hand at her elbow, not Ben’s but Luke;s urging her to her feet, urging towards Ben. Ben, who growls the moment Luke’s hand touches her, his displeasure thick and cold as steel. She watches him carefully, shoulders still, knuckles white against the countertops as he holds himself rigid. Like he doesn’t trust himself to react, afraid he’ll do something. It trickles into her mind like honey, the rage at having another man’s hands on her, omega or not, it’s driving him crazy. His hands shaking as he reaches out for her tugging her close and out of Luke’s grasp. 

The older man offers up a soft knowing smile before taking Rey’s seat perched against the table. He taps his prosthetic fingers against the glossy surface idly while his eyes take him far from whatever this is, lost in a memory of a memory that he’s been fighting to forget, “Our family has a lot of— stuff.” Luke offers.

Ben, to his credit probably doesn’t mean to hold onto her as tight as he does but his need has morphed into this possessive thing. It’s aggressive and painful and terrifyingly all-consuming in a way that for some reason she doesn’t entirely hate, “Luke, really it’s ok.” 

“No, you need to know what you’re getting into with all of us. Especially since you’re carrying Ben’s child.”

“She’s what?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: glazed over issues with the foster system and overtly alpha behaviours from Ben 
> 
> Again, if there is anything I have missed or not thought to tag please let me know so I can make sure to add it in  
> Thanks for reading guys! Come say Hello on [The Twitter](https://twitter.com/rebelscumreylo)


	9. At the end of the day we're helpless, can you keep me close? Can you love me most?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Benjamin, what did you do?”
> 
> “I met a girl,” he offers with a shrug, as though the situation were no more complicated than that. 
> 
> “You met a girl,” she throws out flippantly, “You met a girl and you’re mated and she’s pregnant already. Ben— do you not use your head at all? This— you need to deal with this!”
> 
> “Deal with what?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My brain has been the mush lately. I wanted to have this up ages ago but in typical me fashion I was unhappy with the end result and had to rewrite it a million times. Everyone should thank the amazing [Lane ](https://twitter.com/LaneReads) for betaing this for my. It would not have been posted without her.  
> She is also an incredible writer and you should really go take a gander at her stuff [over here ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlaMac0801)  
> Also, I updated the tags so take a peak. I hope to have the next half up soonish but don’t hold me to it. Love you all!!

When Rey was a little girl there was only one thing in all the world that her heart truly desired. A family. It didn’t matter the shape it took, a mother and a father, a single mother, a single father, brothers, sisters, cousins, uncles, grandparents. All that mattered was that they loved her, that they were hers. She dreamt about them, about what it would feel like to fall into a warm hug after a bad day at school or to have someone laugh at a joke she had told even though it wasn’t all that funny. 

She obsessed over how it would feel to have someone braid her hair, or read her a bedtime story or ask about how her day was and be outraged when she told a small white lie. Not that she lied often, or ever but that was what she imagined it was like to have someone want great things for her. 

She had scrapbooks and journals filed with images she’d cut out from magazines. Smiling faces, bright and happy and full of love. People who might love her, places that they might go, things they might do just because they would want to be together and do things as a family. 

But with every new home she was placed in, a little bit of that dream chipped away. Every new house, every new bed, the bright light that was her hope slowly began to fade. It wasn’t that she was bad or that there was anything necessarily wrong with the families themselves, it just seemed like things never quite fit. Like she was a piece of furniture they were trying to piece into their home. Something to add to their esthetic.

By the time she landed on Plutt’s doorstep she’d presented as an omega and hope had become nothing more than a four-letter word. Her journals were trashed, burnt in a pyre of all her childish things. Scraps of who she was before her parents left her, pieces of a person as fragile as blown glass. She’d been dropped one too many times and left wanting. Left waiting lost on the idea that someday she might find it. A family to call her own.

But Families were a fallacy because even the kids who had them seemed to be miserable and it was easier to pretend she didn’t need anyone. Instead she sunk into her biology, learned how to survive on her own because there was  _ one _ person she could rely on and her name was Rey Niima 

The result, however, was far less practical:, A feral omega who only knew how to do one thing and that was run. For her entire life that was her go-to and now, in this strange house with these strange people amidst this strange thing that might be considered a family, she finds herself trapped. It was easier to pretend that she didn’t want it, someone to belong to.

It hurt far less to remain locked away behind her walls built up of bitter resentment and hiding from the cruel reality that no one really wanted her and yet here he is. A person who wants her, a person who might even love her someday if she let him, and oh how she wants to let him. It drowns out her urge to run. Her need for him is something that creeps into her mind like ivy, wound along the walls she’s built up until her damage is no longer something ugly and her walls don’t seem so high.

She focuses on that instead, on the way he fills in the cracks left behind by others who were far more careless. Still, the hair on the back of her neck prickles, her omega senses kicked up into high gears. The room is filled with so much alpha it’s hard to muddle through it all, trapping her beneath the heavy scent of dominance that urges her to submit. A small voice in the back of her mind whispers to her sweetly, dark words curling along her conscious telling her that this is what she was made for. It would be so easy if only she—

Her panic becomes a thing that Ben can taste, his chest rumbling against her back, a comfort, a warning, it’s hard to tell. His affection is something that she’s learned to sink into as he nuzzles his face against her ear. He’s careful, his attention focused, his touch calculated, keeping her pinned against the counter so effortlessly. Like an animal he’s hunted down and trapped, a toy for him to play with. 

“For heaven’s sake, Benjamin, let the girl go!” Rey hears Ben’s mother’s voice but can’t see her beyond the small space she’s being crowded into. It should feel wrong to be treated this way and yet why does she feel so safe? Tucked away against Ben, sheltered from the other alphas by his body, “She’s not some possession—“

Isn’t she though? Isn’t that how this works between A and O pairs? Is that not the argument made by the government and anyone else with an opinion on the matter? 

Their biology dictates that they have no real say r once the bond has been forged. Everything she is is now his, but in return does that not mean that everything he is now belongs to her as well? That they belong to each other in all ways conceivable?

He could take her anywhere. He could fuck her in a room full of strangers and society would expect her to thank him for it because that’s what omega’s need, is it not? 

A strong hand to guide them and a hard cock to fuck. 

Maybe Leia doesn’t understand because she’s an alpha who is in a relationship with another alpha. Alphas can, after all, be utterly pigheaded when they don’t understand something or think that they might be in the right.. 

Beyond Ben’s arms, Luke mutters something that Rey struggles to pick up on, his tone hollow, voice soft. The exhaustion is woven through his scent like something warm, campfire smoke and wind. She hadn’t noticed it before, not for what it is but the presence of so much alpha in the room is making everything so much  _ more _ . It’s there on the edge of it all beneath Ben’s familiar cedarwood and vanilla that she’s come to find incredibly relaxing. Their scents mixed together as a result of his bite or perhaps the result of hers. Something she can count on, something she can focus on through the litany of other aromas that are currently barreling through her senses. 

Alphas even when they aren’t being alphas are still so incredibly alpha-like. It’s something they can’t seem to reign in. They push their weight around without really meaning to. Like their biology simply can’t help but be this thing that completely takes over.

They’re louder, more aggressive even when they’re quiet, like their thoughts can be heard echoing off the walls because even with their mouth shut they’re still so damn easy to read. Then there’s their scent, the way it becomes this thing that is everywhere, sticking to surfaces and clouding up the judgement of unsuspecting omegas. It’s what makes it all so frustrating, one alpha sitting in a room for five minutes can turn an omega into a puddle of mush when she enters that same room hours after the fact. Compatibility is a factor of course, because not all alpha’s smell the same to all omegas. Leia, for instance, is spiced cinnamon and something dark, like bitter chocolate perhaps and Han is a strange combination of leather and wood, like old books and with the faintest hint of something smokey. Neither scent is unpleasant, and Leia’s is currently tainted with an undercurrent of agitation, but not something that Rey finds herself desperate to sink into.

It makes her wonder if her scent has the same effect on Ben. It might explain the way he lingers after she’s had a shower, or the way he absconds with her favourite blanket when they stay at her house. He sleeps on the couch, yes, but he always seems so happy to do so as he curls himself up in the worn soft fabric like a child with a sookie blanket, tucking it beneath his nose when he sleeps. 

“What did Luke mean, she’s carrying your child?” Leia demands, her alpha presence looming closer, too close, setting Ben’s nerves aflame. It drives the man deep inside letting his alpha prowl loose, his need to protect booming this all-consuming thing that rages through his veins. A rising tide of wild emotions that pours out of him carrying her along with it, desperate to stay afloat. 

“Back up, Princess,” Han sounds from somewhere in the periphery, but even he can’t seem to get his wife to see reason because Leia is not backing down. They’re so alike it’s almost painful, this mother and son combination and Rey has to wonder if Ben can see the truth of it. She pushes and pushes, determined to take control but it’s forcing Ben into a corner and his carefully structured discipline is starting to buckle.

She can feel it, the small cracks in his restraint, his body tight against hers, forearms flexing as a low growl rattles through his chest and into Rey’s timid form. Ragged breaths fall from chapped lips, his throat dry as he hovers, suspended between his need to keep Rey safe and his warning need to either concede to— or challenge, the more dominant alpha in the room.

“No, I want answers. Luke?”

“Not my story to tell,” Rey hears Luke try but the answer isn’t good enough and denying her only proves to agitate Leia further. 

Angry alphas make omegas skittish. They make Omegas want to run but Rey is trapped leaving her with only one clear option— submit. A soft whine escapes her throat, low at first but then building into something pathetic and high pitched that rolls into a whimper. Against her back, Ben’s body stiffens, his hips pressed tight against her hind end. At first, it’s nothing more than a suggestion but as Rey’s panic peaks, so too does Ben’s arousal until the hard line of his cock is tucked up against her. 

Biology, fucking biology, it’s what makes her want to roll over and show her belly. To lie down, be pliant and give Ben what he wants. To give them all what they want. Answers, understanding, anything at all because that’s what omegas do. It’s what they were built for. She wishes she could help the subtle way her hips move to meet him, pressing just so, grinding against him but she can’t because— biology.

“For the love of Christ, Benjamin, stop acting like I’m trying to take your chew toy away. Let the poor girl go—“ Leia snaps and Ben growls, loud and predatory it rattles through him, a vibration that reverberates down along her spine making her— fuck this is awkward. 

This is not a situation in which one should find themselves turned on and yet— well here they are. Angry and horny and confused. All a wonderful mixture of emotions to be experiencing when meeting your boyfriend’s parents for the first time. Boyfriend. Ben is her boyfriend. The thought makes her press her thighs together. Why is that word such a fucking turn on? It wouldn’t have been three days ago. But three days ago he didn’t have her crowded against his parents’ kitchen counter protecting her from— from what? potential threats? 

It seems so ridiculous and yet here they are all the same, driven by these archaic impulses. it’s almost sinful the way it’s so easy to slip into it, like a pair of old slippers, comfortable, well worn, right. 

Taking a steady breath Rey tries to shift beneath Ben’s looming presence. His chest is hard and warm and feels oh so right that it makes her heart flutter. He’s unmovable and yet totally aware of her all at the same time, his breath ghosting past her cheek as he tucks himself closer, using her for clarity. A bright star in the darkness of night, a beacon home and yet the gale-force winds that threaten to sink him, mind, body, and soul. 

A delicate touch causes him to start, her hand moved from the cool marble countertop to the back of Ben’s wrist. Feather-light, cautious, fingertips dancing carefully up and down his arm in slow and even strokes. The motion jolts her forward but his posture soon relaxes, her thumb circling the scent gland at his wrist as she hums, “It’s ok, Ben.” She wants it to be true, needs it to be true so she doubles down, straightening into him and reaching back until the palm of her hand finds his cheek, hot beneath her touch. 

Her touch combined with her scent hits him like a drug, a rush through his system that tempers his rage. He nuzzles against her, her fingers curling through loose locks of dark silky hair. It’s awkward and strained but it works, her wrist twisting against his cheek, his jaw and then finally his neck, bumping and sliding until she finally manages to graze his mating gland. Raised and warm and soft as velvet, Rey works at scenting him, offering him up what little she has to give. She isn’t strong or demanding like an alpha, but omegas have a power too. The power to soothe. Maybe even the power to control.

The contact causes Ben to shudder, his shoulders ease, his breath spilling out in a low and steady hiss. Like a punctured balloon losing air, her large alpha deflates just a little and in time when he curls himself over her, it’s in a protective sort of hug and not some territorial pissing context. His mouth is a warm brand against her clothed shoulder, pressing kisses along a path drawn first by his nose sweeping back and forth until, as if by instinct he’s drawn to the spot, the one marked by his teeth. The one she has been careful to keep hidden just in case. 

He’s like an overgrown feline drunk on catnip and she’s the nip, drunkenly murmuring words against her neck that send shivers down her spine. Words so sweet and deliciously kind that fill her heart with an overwhelming surge of affection because those words sound— but no. Her heartbeat stutters, like tripping over shoelaces, and his words are caught up around her feet, catching her off guard because it sounds an awful lot like— but no— but maybe?— In front of everyone? 

He wouldn’t.

But oh how he definitely would. So casual, so cool as though it’s just as easy as that. Something that should be private the first time it’s said out loud, something just for them. But— but maybe she misheard him. It’s possible after all, there is so much going on, so much to take in. Maybe he didn’t just say something so monumental here in front of everyone as though he were telling her he liked her skirt. 

Anger, irrational and wild bubbles up like a supernova ready to blow. Alphas be damned, screw them all, each and every one of them for thinking that it’s their god-given right to take. Things, people, moments. Stolen away because their nature dictates it. 

“Ben, get off me,” Rey practically seethes, shrugging again into the immovable wall that is her alpha’s chest, “Now, please. I need— space, Ben,” she struggles, “I need space,” and yet even she can’t be convinced of this lie. A show of independence that falls short of being anything more than a joke because the simple request makes her panic and she knows he can feel it. She knows he can sense the building unease, the way her body calls out to him, begging him not to listen. Not to give in to her demands because any space is too much.

He knows, he has to, she tells herself quietly because Ben is a good partner and a good alpha. He’s a good mate, so of course, he understands. 

Please god, let him understand—

“But—“ she hears him mumble, rebuking another one of her pathetic attempts to shrug him away. It’s a strange position she’s putting him in, trapped between listening to what it is that she’s asking and what her body is telling him. Confusing, upside-down and yet his hold is unyielding and the world around them seems to grow smaller and smaller until they’re the only two left. Alpha and omega, male and female, partners. Because they’re partners in this, in it together. A realization that dawns like the sun settling in her belly like a warm hearty meal.

It takes some maneuvering, but eventually she manages to get herself turned around. The marble countertop at her back is a harsh reminder of their predicament but Ben is there and he’s warm and his words, so sweet, so sincere, flutter through her mind even now. “Ben,” Rey tries, pushing against him just so, working her arms between their bodies until she’s touching his face, cradling it between the palms of her hands as she pulls him closer until their foreheads are touching. 

His eyes close as she says his name again, working through the mire of his emotions as she holds him in place. Holds him steady, “Ben,” she tries again, her voice lowering into a seductive sort of purr as, “Alpha—“ slithers off her tongue and through him like ice water. 

Ben’s hips press and his fingers squeeze, working the material of her skirt between them as they move to her waist and he stands, spine ramrod straight, “listen to me,” she sings to him softly, “it’s ok.”

“What is she—?” she barely hears someone ask and then Luke is shushing them. Luke— because he knows. He knows exactly what is going on and he’s trying to protect them in his own subtle way— to give them peace. 

“I’m ok,” she affirms, closing her eyes, nuzzling their noses together, “You’re ok.”

“Ok,” Ben finally repeats, dazed and mollified for the moment, a shuddering sigh released from his chest before his lips meet hers. Soft, a kiss that starts slow, curious and tender, as Ben stumbles back through the darkness. The gentle graze of mouths offering promises, quiet and sweet, bringing his world back into focus. One of his hands, his very large hands, hands that Rey has come to love more than she cares to admit, slips from her waist. It’s warm comfort, a soft pressure now pressed just below her navel as a smile flirts with his mouth. His beautiful, wonderful mouth that she hasn’t had enough of kissing yet. 

It’s not much, but it’s theirs, this private moment shared, something small that they’ll build into something that could be awe-inspiring. 

When Ben finally pulls himself away there’s something calmer to his continence, his voice an even baritone as the truth spills out of him, “Rey is pregnant,” he tells his mother with as much confidence as he can muster, “We’re mated and she’s pregnant,” and there it is, nothing more to it than that. 

Only Leia seems to be waiting for more, her eyes wide and owlish as the accusation falls heavy in the air, “What did you do?” vicious and brutally barbed. Her eyes flicker between Ben’s face and the place around Rey’s middle where his hand rests protectively. Hers, he’s hers, a thought that flutters through her brain on dark tides, stroking at something possessive, something primal that burbles to life in the pit of Rey’s belly. Something that makes her want to bite and hiss and attack this brazen alpha who poses such a dire threat to their fragile little family, “Benjamin, what did you do?”

“I met a girl,” he offers with a shrug, as though the situation were no more complicated than that. 

Han snickers and Luke groans, muttering something to himself about needing a drink before removing himself from the front line to join Han at the back of the room. Together the two work at pulling out tumblers, pouring a generous helping of amber liquor into each while Leia remains frozen in place, primed and ready for attack. 

“You met a girl,” she throws out flippantly, “You met a girl and you’re mated and she’s pregnant already. Ben— do you not use your head at all? This— you _ need _ to deal with this!”

“Deal with what?” Ben seethes, his voice dark, edged with something terrifying. 

“This situation, you— how did this even happen? You’ve been together, what— a week? That isn’t enough time to—“ suddenly everything stills, everything but Ben who fidgets with her shirt, information tumbling through his mind until clarity hits. This connection to his conscious is enough to drown out her of existence entirely if she were to allow it. His presence is a thing that fills up the room, pushing everything back until there is nothing but him. His emotions, his thoughts, his overwhelming need to protect and the violent urge to tear the world apart. 

It fills the space around them, a warning to anyone who might think to get too close. Leia cautiously takes half a step back, her hand clutched at her throat but it’s Han who speaks first. While his mother appears offended, Han however looks horrified, “Oh Princess, what did you do?” he groans softly, a tumbler full of whiskey clutched in the halo of his fingertips. 

“Leia—“ Luke pushes.

But no one is prepared for Ben when he finally snaps, “You’re having me followed?” His body moving with the stealth and grace of a wild cat, only stopping when Rey’s fingers wrap around his wrist. The pressure is barely there but it holds him in place like a shock collar. Like a junkyard dog at the end of his rope, Ben gnashes his teeth, a growl, feral and dark building up from her chest as Rey stands the long peg in the ground tethering him to sanity. 

If Leia is troubled by this outwards display of hostility she keeps it pinned down. There is no fear nor concern at all worn on her aged and beautiful face. Only boredom and perhaps aloof agitation. As though her son is not some fierce alpha beast but a kitten toying with her apron strings, “What would you have me do, Benjamin? You work for that— creature and I’m supposed to— what? Sit by and wait for you to get arrested?”

“I’ve never—“

“Don’t, don’t say another word. I can’t—“ she huffs, “I’m a Supreme Court Judge Ben, you know what that means. And now what? You go from working for that snake to—“ quirking a brow Leia’s head turns just so, inviting Ben to provide some form of answer, to give context to a story that she only seems to have the Cole’s notes on.

“Being happily mated,” Ben snaps through clenched teeth “And I don’t work for Snoke now, though I’m sure you’re already very aware of that fact. And, I was never involved in any—“

“You could have been implicated! You and I both know that—“ 

“Again, how do you know, Mother? Hmm? Are you having Threepio follow me?” Her lack of an answer is answer enough, “That poor man, I hope you pay him well.”

“He’s liberally compensated for his work.”

Anger and frustration bounce around in Rey’s chest as she tries to play catch up. Things are happening far too quickly, questions sprouting like weeds in her carefully curated garden. Tossed aside with careless frustration, buried beneath fear that has been curated from years of biological suppression. It’s the boys in the group home all over again, their taunting jeers and scratching at her door. The small closet with a lock that she was forced to hide in during her heats, praying every night that the lock would hold. Scared, doubled over in pain and so desperate for some form of touch. Crying herself to sleep saturated in slick and tears with her fingers buried deep in her cunt. Fingers that would never be enough because her body needed more. 

Betrayed by her biology. 

“Ben—“ she starts, squeezing his hand, trying to pull him back, trying to press herself against him because that’s what she needs. She needs him, needs the safety provided by his body, safety that only he can give. 

“How long—“ he barks out instead, his tone sharp, frightening. Pushing forward when his mother refuses to answer. “How long have you been having me followed?” Again she says nothing, her expression unchanged, biding her time, patiently waiting for an opportunity to strike.

“Couldn’t be that long otherwise you would have known something was up long before now.”

“Ben, you need to deal with this—“ this, this, this, Leia keeps saying he needs to deal with  _ this _ but hasn’t bothered to indicate what ‘this’ might be. Their relationship? Rey?

Cold dread settles into the marrow of her bones, her heart-stopping for just a breath. The air in the room is starting to feel far too thin and it’s hard to fill her lungs as she gulps down desperate mouthfuls. This. Her. Them. 

A trembling hand reaches for the space where their little seed grows as Rey’s panic morphs into something more akin to blind terror. This. Deal with this. She couldn’t—

“Ben,” Rey tries again, a soft groan met with a whimper that has him on her in a matter of moments, his eyes wide, hands searching, caressing, pawing. 

He shushes her with a soft kiss to her forehead, his arms moving to wrap themselves securely around her shoulders. This. Them. Theirs. He will protect them, he won’t let his mother near.

“Leia—“ Luke says after a mouth full of whiskey and a sharp smack of his lips, “careful.”

“Me Careful? Me? Really now, that’s rich. I know you’re close with the girl but Luke, you have to see the issues here?”

“The only issue I see is the one that you’re causing. You need to back down.”

This. An untraceable heartbeat. The flutter of life that’s just barely begun. It’s far too early to feel anything other than nausea but that doesn’t make it any less real. The theirs that they made, the him that’s forever changed her, that’s now hers forever. 

She doesn’t need to tell him that she’s frightened because her fear is as real to him as it is to her. He knows because he works hard at understanding, at listening to the way her heart sings to him through their bond. He knows because he’s a good alpha and a good mate and he is hers as much as she is his and they belong together. They belong to each other and together they are— they’re a family. Fragile in its infancy but it’s the start of something they can build on and she’s not willing to give that up for anything. 

“You want to go home?” She hears Ben ask softly. Home, the word a mere concept but it means everything, a place where they will be safe. A place where he will hold her and love her—

“Ben, we need to talk about this,” his mother says but Ben isn’t listening. He’s sunk into the bond that’s ripped open between them, collecting bits of her fear and making space for them in his heart. His eyes are trained on hers, deep pools of amber, like honied sunlight whispering promises of protection and care.

Holding her face just so, Ben presses his forehead to hers, “We can leave,” he offers, ignoring his mother’s cry of outrage, “Just say the word,” because his family’s chains will never hold them. 

But it doesn’t take a word, it doesn’t take anything more than a soft nod of her head and Ben’s smile turns into something dangerously fierce. He doesn’t look at his mother, doesn’t even acknowledge his father or Luke. He simply takes Rey’s hand and pulls her away. 

It all happens so quickly, the kitchen turns into the hallway and the next thing Rey knows they’re standing in front of the front door again. Ben’s hand is in hers, the only thing she finds she’s able to concentrate on, the only thing that feels real. Someone is talking, making demands, their voice a dull roar against the white noise that’s settled into Rey’s mind. A gentle buzz and the steady beating of Ben’s heart that she can feel in her chest. 

And then she’s moving without thought, toeing off her slippers and adjusting her pantyhose. It feels like she’s moving in slow motion, or perhaps someone has hit fast forward on everything except her, because things are happening quickly. Ben’s boots are on and his arms are full of their things before Rey can even turn to seek out her own footwear. She’s so focused on tracking down her boots that the gentle hand on her shoulder causes her to start. 

Luke’s smile is soft, his eyes kind as he places his hands on Rey’s upper arms. They’re nearly the same height and yet Luke seems so small, as though his sister’s consistent tirade is wearing him down. With a tender kiss to her forehead, he offers her a quiet, “Welcome to the family I guess,” before sidestepping Ben, who bustles back into the house, a man on a mission. There’s a cold nip to the air and his cheeks are a rosy pink as he rubs his hands together surveying the room for anything they might have missed.

“You ok?” Rey nods and he smiles, a small act that means more to her than he will ever know, a promise that this all will soon be over. It’s dark now and it’ll be late by the time they make it back home— his, hers, it doesn’t matter as long as he’s there with her. Nor does the nearly six hours that they’ll have spent in the car and all for what? 

Ben’s hand is at her elbow and he’s handing her her boots. She knows what to do but her body seems to have missed the memo because suddenly Ben is unzipping the suede and helping them onto her feet. He’s dressing her like a child. She needs to snap out of it but her body feels heavy and her mind feels like it’s wading through molasses because there is so much tension in the air and her omega is terrified. 

“We haven’t finished discussing this,” Leia’s voice cracks like a whip through the air, edged with something that sounds a little like desperation, like she’s losing control and she knows it. 

It’s hard not to respond to the alpha in her tone but Ben’s presence is a comfort. His hands at Rey’s thigh brush over her knee as he moves to stand. Hands that find her face, cupping her cheeks while his eyes search. always searching. Questions asked without words, as his gaze falls upon her warming her soul like the first cup of coffee on a cold winter’s morning.

He pulls her in, grounds her in place with eyes filled with affection before speaking, “No,” determined, final, his stony resolve making Rey weak in the knees. “ _ You _ aren’t done discussing this. I am, we are. I’m not going to sit here and have you try and tell me how to live my life like I’m twelve years old again. I thought maybe you might find it in your heart to be happy for me, for us. I thought a baby would be seen as a blessing despite everything else but you’re going to be a grandmother and all you care about is the optics.” 

It feels as though a weight has been lifted, a shift that buoy’s up in Rey’s chest. As though Ben has managed to free himself of some dark bondage pulling her out into the bright light of day again, “You can do this to me but I will not allow you to do this to Rey, or to our child. This baby is not something that will be set aside for the sake of convenience. I know it was easy to do with me but that will not be our child’s life. Our child— Our child will be loved,” Ben’s voice cracks, his fingers winding through Rey’s in order to hold himself steady. She can feel it, the way his pulse hums and the barrage of feelings that swims through her soul untethered and without context. Bits of him that she can only catch glimpses of as she continues to struggle with the weight of their connection. “It may not fit what you think a family should look like, or how things should be but it’s mine,” a pause and Rey looks up to find Ben’s gaze settled upon her fondly, the weight of his affection warm, like a kiss to her mating gland, “Ours,” he adds with the smallest of smiles, his voice turning soft, “It’s new and it’s scary but I will not let you turn it into something to be ashamed of.”

Leia bristles, her lips pursed, cheeks an odd shade of red, “Ben—“ slow and easy she schools her expression but it’s her mouth that betrays her, “You need to think clearly about this—“

“I am!” Ben finally roars, “For the first time in my life I am. You’re the one who needs to give your head a shake. You. Not me. Having me followed, really?” Releasing Rey’s hand Ben stalks forward, his expression dark, pale skin away with the golden flow from the warm light that illuminated the home’s grand entryway, “Funny though, it didn’t quite work out the way I imagine you had hoped, did it, Mother?” 

As Ben’s irritation builds it becomes a creeping sensation that crawls beneath Rey’s skin. Like worms wriggling beneath sun-warmed earth, struggling to make their way to the surface, “Your little spy was late to the game—“ she can’t quite see which direction he’s taking but there are words on her tongue, acrid and cruel pulled from the depth of some hole deep in Ben’s gut. 

Before she can stop it there’s whimper at her throat, something high pitched and pathetic because he wouldn’t— 

“We’ve actually been mated for months now. Yeah. I fucked up pretty big,” it feels wrong when he says it, cold and bitter, like ice wind at the nape of her neck, “It was a one night stand, we met in a bar, went back to my hotel and we  _ fucked, _ ” she wants to tell him no, that’s not at all that happened. They laughed at the bar, he flirted atrociously but was sweet and offered to buy her a drink. He’d even used some stupid pick up line that she can’t for the life of her recall because his words hadn’t mattered at that point. They had a connection, it’d just taken her until now to see the truth of the matter, “I bit her without her permission and she  _ hated  _ me.” To hear it said with such pain and derision cleaves her soul in two. It breaks her apart piece by piece because this is the truth as he sees it. His recollection of events tainted with self-hatred. “I was a goddamn mess over the whole thing but Threepio missed that part didn’t he? Your little gopher missed the part where my whole world fell apart.”

The stunned look on Ben’s mother’s face might be comical if the whole thing wasn’t so incredibly sad. And still, Ben barrels through with all the tact of a bull moose learning to ride a bike while Han and Luke watch from the sidelines, “Did he tell you that I chased her down an alleyway?”

Oh no— no, no, no, “Ben,” Rey tries but her voice struggles against the rising tide of emotions that still threaten to drown her. They pull her this way and that as Ben tries to sort through them, the vague impression of raw emotion that bleeds into another and another. The bond between them is an open fissure pouring his thoughts into her mind, a steady stream of regret that doesn’t quite feel like regret. The shape of it blurred around the edges as he relieves the moment in real-time. The way her scent called to him, how desperately he had needed her, how he hated himself for allowing it all to happen and yet— There, just there beneath it all the truth comes together like a clash of tectonic plates shouldering through her. 

His regret is a thing that he intellectualizes instead of feels, the hollow shape of something that isn’t quite because he doesn’t regret it at all, not really. He wants to, he knows that he should and is ashamed that he can't but the truth is there as clear as day. His shame on display for her like a gift presented at her feet. It’s the one thing in his life that he will celebrate until the end of his days. A dirty secret that he keeps close to his chest because that moment, that horrible beautiful moment brought them here. It gave his life a purpose and changed him in ways that were at first minute but now have left him a better man. 

He hates that he hurt her, hates that he continues to do so even now, but given the chance, he wouldn’t change a damn thing because what they are is messy but it’s beautiful too. She just wishes he could see that, that he could understand that it’s ok that their beginning was messy because it brought them together and she— 

Shaking her head Rey groans, desperate to grab Ben’s attention but he isn’t listening. He’s lost, drowning in the raging hostility that burns its way through his veins. Her groan becomes a whine that evolves into a whimper as she blindly grabs for his hand because he isn’t stopping and everything that they are is just there on display to be picked at and scrutinized and no—

“Did he tell you—“ 

On a whim Rey reaches out, focusing her emotions, drawing on the roiling turmoil that sets her blood aflame and she pushes. Forcing her will into the space that’s between them, the one that they share. The rift where it’s nearly impossible to tell where one ends and the other begins but Ben’s voice softens suddenly and Rey can feel the way his words melt like sugar on his tongue. Softening at the edges, less crass, less cruel, “That I—“ he breaks, “I don’t deserve her—“ 

“Ben, it’s ok,” Rey tries, if for no other reason than just to make him stop but it’s not ok. It feels broken and wrong, like these strangers seeing their damage makes it somehow less theirs. Their story, their life. It’s not some happy Disney romance but something built from harsh reality, a modern-day Hans Christian Anderson tale about love and need. Will theirs have a happy ending, or will she turn to seafoam and disappear with the tide. Because that is what loving an alpha feels like. Like being pulled too thin, dismantled and reconstructed until you are a part of their ocean, your former self lost— forgotten. 

When Ben finally looks back his eyes glimmer, dark and afraid, the eyes of a little boy who has never really felt loved. It’s there in her heart, as real and painful as though it were her own. Something she understands because it’s a darkness she has felt too. Words he’s never spoken out loud, whispered fears that fill his sleepless nights. Pieces of him she’s only speculated on, holding her down, settling around her like a weighted blanket. His reason, his desperation, “I’m so sorry,” he warbles softly, “I’m so sorry that I can’t regret it. That I— I couldn’t control— I want to but—“ 

But he cannot bring himself to regret and she cannot find it in her heart to begrudge him that. Such a small thing really. 

“You’re just like him,” Leia gasps and the room falls silent. The change in the atmosphere is immediate, like someone or something has sucked all of the oxygen out of the room leaving Ben to tumble through a wide series of emotions until he settles on hurt. So much hurt, deep and raw, like craters raked into his soul. His eyes are wide as he takes his mother in, the eyes of a boy betrayed by the one who was supposed to love him no matter what. It takes a moment for Rey to truly pull it all together, to take in the extent of the damage wrong with those four little words but the impact has hit like a spear to the chest.

Like him.

It echoes in Ben’s mind leaving Rey to scramble. It’s like a bomb has been detonated, Ben’s body too still as the walls he’s built-up to carefully hold himself back start to crumble leaving her at the centre of it all confused and alone. 

“Ben go—“ Han orders, “Now. Go!” It’s sharp but there’s something else too, the scent of something that Rey can’t quite identify. 

Luke is pushing passed Leia, a hand on Ben’s shoulder urging him towards the door, “Go,” he says softly, “Go now, I’ll talk to her— try and fix this but you need to go—“ No one moves and honestly Rey isn’t entirely sure what she’s expected to do. Her legs won’t work, like Ben is willing them in place, “Rey, get him out of here before this gets bad,” this isn’t bad? And what exactly does Luke think she can do anyway? “Get him to explain it all to you in the car—“ 

“But it’s your—“ Ben tries half-heartedly, cut off when Luke gives him another push, harder this time, more insistent. 

His name, “Luke!” breaks through the chaos making him shudder. The alpha in his sister’s voice crashing down over him, desperate to take control of the situation, “Ben, I swear to God.” 

It doesn’t make sense, none of this makes sense. It’s like standing at the centre of a whirlwind trying to figure out which way to move next. One wrong step and you’ll end up in a tailspin and lose yourself. 

“Fucking go,” Rey hears Luke bellow, the volume of his voice startling Ben out of his stupor. He’s lost for want to react, pulled in too many directions. Trying to triage his emotions but there’s a storm brewing, a danger coiling around Rey’s throat warning her, whispering to her from the dark recesses of some deep-set biological impulse. The omega in her chest is telling her to bolt. 

“Ben,” her turn now, fingers grazing the scent gland along the inside of his wrist, “Ben,” his name like a promise as she reaches out, rubbing her wrist against his neck. His shoulders slump, chest heaving with a breath she hadn’t been aware they had both been holding onto, “Alpha,” she coos, calling his attention away from his mother, away from Luke, away from those four words that are still tearing through him now. She needs him to focus, “Alpha, take me home,” she hears herself murmur demurely, linking their fingers together in order to give a soft tug. 

Her plea seems to have the desired effect, the world around them bleeds from bright lights to darkness as Ben ushers her out into the cold. His scent has peaked into something wild, like the air before a thunderstorm. At their back, a door closes leaving them on the other side of chaos. Angry voices tearing through the night while the elegant home sits amongst its well-manicured gardens like something out of a dream. Something picturesque and perfect to mask the unrest and turmoil locked inside. 

In the distance now, Leia shrieks and Luke hollers and Rey is fifteen again, locked in a small closet surrounded by threadbare sheets and pillows that smell like mildew. It’s that helpless feeling that brings her back to a time where alpha boys would try and shove their hands under the doorframe, fingers wriggling, their scent glands scraping against the wood as the madness of her early heats overtook her. It’s the screaming of the other girls who called her a whore and a slut because she was born an omega. Because their boyfriends were interested and people just didn’t understand.

She’s alone again, alone and afraid but there’s a hand on her back, warm and persistent. The hand of a man who steers her towards a car where he tucked her away within the safety of its sturdy steel frame. Her heartbeat hammers in her chest, a steady thrum that makes her feel like she might just throw up. Maybe it’s stress, or maybe it’s the pregnancy because there is bile burbling up within her esophagus as Ben slides into the car, his scent frantic and yet somehow still calming. 

And for a moment they just sit there, the house illuminated by the glowing amber lights beaming from the open windows. Ben’s hands grab the steering wheel, the leather groaning beneath his palms as he flexes and squeezes and torques his wrists. 

It’s strained but they’re safe now and she wants to tell him that it’s ok but the words seem foreign and strange. Like half-truths spoken to little children in order to keep them calm. Only Ben isn’t a child and Rey isn’t a liar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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